This story is free to read.

Chattanooga State students in technical programs begin to return to campus for hands-on labs, classes amid COVID-19 crisis

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Machine Tool Technology Senior Instructor Wade Silvey, right, helps Jacob Roerdink in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday. Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Machine Tool Technology Senior Instructor Wade Silvey, right, helps Jacob Roerdink in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday.

By Meghan Mangrum May 19, 2020 5 min read

You can only learn so much from a book – at least that’s what Wade Silvey and his students say.

Silvey is a senior instructor for the machine tool program at Chattanooga State Community College’s Tennessee College of Applied Technology program.

He and half a dozen students spent Tuesday inside TCAT Building #2 on the college’s main campus off Amnicola Highway even as a majority of college students in Chattanooga and nationally are still taking classes online this summer.

As Chattanooga State slowly phases in a reopening plan for students and staff ahead of the fall semester, about 500 students are already taking classes on campus this summer. They are students in the final semesters of some of the TCAT programs who are leaning over mills and drill presses in the machine tool lab or welding pieces together or working on cars in other labs.

Photo Gallery

Chattanooga State students return to campus

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Jim Barrott, Executive Vice President at Chattanooga State Community College with primary responsibility for the Tennessee College of Applied Technology, speaks to the Times Free Press in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday.

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Student Jacob Roerdink works in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday.

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Colton Erwin, bottom, and three of his fellow students work in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday.

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Student Mike Daub works in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday.

Staff photo by C.B. Schmelter / Student Chenaniah Lewis works in the Machine Tool Lab in the TCAT 2 Building on the campus of Chattanooga State Community College on Tuesday, May 19, 2020 in Chattanooga, Tenn. While most classes at the college have continued online, a few classes began instruction on campus on Monday.

“These are hands-on programs and students have already missed six weeks this semester due to moving online for the coronavirus,” said Jim Barrott, executive vice president at Chattanooga State and head of its TCAT program. “You can only do so much book work, you’ve got to get them on the machines.”