Appeals allowed the law to be put into effect just 54 days before the 2014 elections, overturning a previous ruling in federal court. On October 9, 2014, the state was again barred from implementing the voter ID law for 2014 by the U.S. Supreme Court. On March 23, 2015, the Supreme Court denied writ of certiorari, thus ruling in favor of the state of Wisconsin's new stricter voter ID law. Rejection of health care funds In January 2012, Walker returned a $37.6 million federal grant meant to set up a health exchange in Wisconsin for the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. Walker said "Stopping the encroachment of Obamacare in our state, which has the potential to have a devastating impact on Wisconsin's economy, is a top priority." Walker rejected an $11 million federal grant designed to improve Medicaid enrollment systems. It can take up to 3 months to determine whether an applicant qualifies for the program. If the applicant does not qualify, the state must pay the medical costs for the first three months. The Walker administration previously said it wants to end the practice of presuming some applicants are eligible and go to a real-time system for determining eligibility. Walker rejected an expansion of Medicaid coverage for the state, but instead reduced the eligibility requirements for the state's BadgerCare program. Education On April 2, 2012, Walker signed a law to fund evaluation of the reading skills of kindergartners as part of an initiative to ensure that students are reading at or above grade level by 3rd grade. The law also created a system for evaluating teachers and principals based in part on the performance of their students. It specified that student performance metrics must be based on objective measures, including their performance on standardized tests. Walker approved a two-year freeze of tuition at the University of Wisconsin System in the 2013 budget. In 2014, he proposed a two-year extension of the freeze based on expected cash balances for the system in excess of $1 billion. On February 3, 2015, Walker delivered a budget proposal to the Wisconsin Legislature, in which he recommended placing the University of Wisconsin System under the direction of a "private authority", governed by the Board of Regents (all the governor's appointees). The budget proposal called for a 13% reduction in state funding for the university system. The budget proposal also called for re-writing the