provided $3.1 billion for title VI, including advance funds) could be made available for education reform projects that provided same-gender schools and classrooms consistent with applicable law. The amendment was agreed to, 99-0. [Vote 151, 6/28/00] XXXX Voted For “Social Promotion.” In 2000, XXXX voted against an amendment that would allow social promotion (the formal or informal practice of promoting a student to the next grade level even though the student failed) to continue for any child who had not been afforded an “opportunity to learn the material necessary” to meet achievement standards. On the next vote, XXXX voted against banning federal funding to schools that had not prohibited the practice of social promotion. [Vote 30, 3/2/00; Vote 31, 3/2/00] XXXX Opposed Expressing Sense of Senate that Education Should Be a Priority Over Tax Cuts to the Wealthy. In 1999, XXXX voted against a motion to waive the Budget Act to consider an amendment to the Taxpayer Refund Act of 1999 by Sen. Bingaman that would have expressed the sense of the Senate that $132 billion "should be shifted from tax breaks that disproportionately benefit upper income taxpayers to sustain our investment in public education," including by "investing" in disabilities education, the Pell Grant Program, the Head Start Program, and the initiative to reduce class size by giving Federal funding to public schools to hire more teachers. [Vote 232, 7/30/99] XXXX Voted Against Using Welfare to Assist with Education. In 1998, XXXX voted against an amendment that changes Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Act to allow up to 24 months of postsecondary education and vocational education training to be counted as permissible work activities and removes teens from 30 percent education limitation imposed by TANF. The amendment would allow states to count up to two years of post-secondary or vocational education toward work requirements for welfare parents under the 1996 welfare law (PL 104-193). Current law allows states to count up to one year of vocational education toward the requirement. The amendment also would prohibit states from counting teenage welfare parents' education toward the 30 percent education limitation imposed by the 1996 law. [Vote 191, 7/9/98] XXXX Voted Against Recognizing ‘Blue Ribbon’ Schools. In 1998, XXXX voted against an amendment to replace the savings account language with language to establish a program to award $100,000 each to nationally recognized public or private "Blue Ribbon" schools [Vote 97, 4/23/98] XXXX Voted to Use Federal Funds for Same Gender School and Classrooms. In 1998, XXXX voted for an amendment that allows use of Federal education funds in Title VI of ESEA for education reform projects that provide same gender schools and classrooms. [Vote 89, 4/21/98] XXXX Voted to Abolish the NEA. In 1997, XXXX voted for a bill that would have abolished the NEA. [Vote 245, 9/17/97] XXXX Voted to Award Funds for Education Directly to Local Agencies. In 1997, XXXX cast a crucial vote to award funds for elementary and secondary education directly to local agencies. [Vote 232, 9/11/97] XXXX Voted Against Money for School Breakfast Programs. In 1997, XXXX voted to kill the Wellstone amendment to S.936, which was an amendment to transfer $5 million per year for five years from the Defense Department to the school breakfast program. The usefulness of this vote in the current political environment is marginal, since the offset is Defense Department funding. [Vote 162, 7/9/97] 85