Students get hands-on experience building tiny home
Sep 16, 2021, 4:35 PM | Updated: 4:35 pm
KAYSVILLE, Utah — While 249 square feet is not a lot of space, it’s helping students gain mansion-sized amounts of experience they can take with them on the job.
Bryce Chapman at Davis Technical College said about 50 high school students all helped build what they call the “mighty tiny home.”
He’s a plumbing instructor and his counterparts in each area — electrical, welding and carpentry — all oversee the project.
“So we scrutinize it and if it’s not, we don’t leave it,” he said. “So everything’s been installed properly and it’s built to last. It’s built to be a very nice place for somebody to get away on.”
“That’s not very big, but you look around, it’s very spacious,” Chapman added. “It’s got the living area, and if you walk back this way, we’ve got the full kitchen area, full-sized kitchen sink.”
The project is just one of the ways the college gives students some real-life experience, and Chapman said employers are usually very eager to hire them.
“All those trades are in high demand right now, so this is just an opportunity to just give them some type of a head start in their life of work coming up,” he said.
And for students like Alan Aguirre, it helps him check off his first year in pursuing a degree in construction management, all while he finishes high school.
“I’m trying to go into the construction management field, and I heard this covers up your first year at Weber State, or like any other construction management program in Utah,” Aguirre said.
The “mighty tiny home” recently sold for $40,000 at auction. Those funds will go back into the program, paying for materials to build a second, slightly larger one.
