An 8-3 vote by the Board of Elementary and Secondary Education on Friday afternoon cleared the way for the stateâs education commissioner to eventually take remote and hybrid learning models off the table for local school districts. The board approved emergency regulations giving Commissioner Jeff Riley the authority to decide when full and partial remote schooling will no longer count toward student learning time requirements, taking a step towards the next phase of pandemic-era schooling in Massachusetts. âWe are at an interesting time. We have seen our numbers go way down,â Riley said. âWeâve seen the vaccines and the promise of the vaccines go way up, and we think now is the time to begin to move our children back to school more robustly. The medical community believes that, and I think now is the time to make that call.â