LAKE PLACID — A Lake Placid Elementary School student tested positive for COVID-19 this week, but the response has changed since the fall and winter. With many people in the school community now vaccinated, and with contact between students still limited, the school will remain open.

In many ways, the way the school responds to positive cases now is similar to how it responded at the start of the school year: When a student or staff member tests positive, that person is ordered to isolate, and contact tracing identifies all who may have been exposed to the coronavirus through close contact lasting more than 10 minutes. But the majority of Lake Placid’s teachers, and many eligible students age 16 and older, are now fully vaccinated, according to school district Superintendent Roger Catania. That cuts down significantly the number of people who are required to quarantine after a possible exposure.

When the elementary school student tested positive on Tuesday, just eight people were required to quarantine as a precaution, according to Catania.

Since spring break, the Lake Placid Central School District has seen a handful of positive cases among both students and staff. In the past, the district has had to shift large swaths of its students and teachers to remote instruction because of positive cases, either because too many people were ordered to quarantine or because of staffing shortages. But neither the elementary school nor the middle-high school has had to close recently.

“In all of those cases, we were able to limit the impact to schooling,” Catania said Thursday. “Unfortunately, it still disrupts individuals.”

Catania added that most younger students who have tested positive have had either no symptoms or mild symptoms, and the school is always thankful for that. Catania also said there have been few times, if any, when people who were required to quarantine after a possible exposure within the school community subsequently tested positive.

“Quarantines are perventative,” Catania said. “The fact that the students who are quarantined do not catch COVID is reflective of our school’s health and safety precautions.”

Catania said he believes things like the school’s mask requirements and air filtration systems have “almost always ensured that our students are not spreading (COVID) through school.” The district has also split its middle-high school students into smaller “cohorts” and limited interaction between cohorts. At the elementary school, there’s limited interaction between classrooms. No visitors have been allowed inside either of the school buildings.

Catania briefed the district Board of Education on the latest COVID numbers during the board’s meeting on Tuesday.

“We know COVID is still with us, but we are managing these situations differently than we did earlier in the year, and that’s allowed us to keep our schools open,” Catania told the board.