Tupper Lake’s Elaina Daniels, right, reaches to save the ball from the end line while Saranac Lake’s Olivia Bell pressures the play during a game on the Red Storm’s floor, Saturday, January 11, 2020. (Enterprise photo — Lou Reuter)

TUPPER LAKE — Elaina Daniels said keeping her eye on graduation is what got her through her senior year at Tupper Lake High School during the coronavirus pandemic. It was a very hard year educationally, she said.

“I feel like it’s been all work and barely any reward,” she said Monday. “This was supposed to be the year that was rewarding, and it just really hasn’t been.”

Socially, she said friend groups drifted apart this year or became smaller because they were separated by the pandemic. She hasn’t seen half of the senior class in months.

“Everyone really lost motivation this year,” she said.

She said she’s heard rumors of students dropping out this year. Russ Bartlett, superintendent of the Tupper Lake Central School District, also said this year’s graduation class is a small one, which the district has anticipated for years.

Daniels personally knows one student who dropped out to start work at a car shop.

She said she stuck it out through the last year by thinking about the future.

“As a girl, I feel like there’s more opportunities if I stay in school and go to college than if I were to not,” Daniels said. “I feel like I wouldn’t have very many job opportunities besides like waitressing, which I do now.”

She plans to attend SUNY Potsdam in the fall to major in early education, a field she’s been passionate about for a long time.