Meet our experts!

Kelsey Longmuir is the senior manager of apprenticeship design at CareerWise USA, Links to an external site.a modern youth organization. In that capacity, she works to expand CareerWise's portfolio of youth apprenticeship occupations by working with subject matter experts in a given role or industry to determine whether or not that occupation is a good fit for youth apprenticeship. If it is a good fit, she works with employers in that field to define key skills, knowledge, and abilities that the apprentice should learn over the three-year apprenticeship.

Matt McKenney joined the Institute for American Apprenticeships (IAA) in 2021 as its CEO. Matt has over 12 years of experience with apprenticeships in advanced manufacturing. He started his career as a TIG welder and a CNC programmer for Hypertherm, a world leader in industrial cutting technologies. At Hypertherm, Matt was a frontline manufacturing leader, and an operations leader before taking a role as a technical trainer delivering related instruction for Registered Apprenticeship Programs. After being asked to lead the training institute, Matt, in partnership with the IAA, registered multiple occupations and graduated more than 700 apprentices over 10 years. Matt was also the HR generalist / business partner for the entire operations team for three years before becoming the director of workforce development, where he leveraged youth apprenticeship, pre-apprenticeship, and Registered Apprenticeship to strategically pipeline talent into the organization.

Steve Lutton joined the IAA in 2010 as executive director. For the past 12 years, Steve has been developing and implementing Registered Apprenticeship Programs for IAA employer-partners in the fields of advanced manufacturing, IT, business services, and health care. Steve has worked on every aspect of Registered Apprenticeship, from developing and registering standards with the U.S. Department of Labor and State Apprenticeship Agencies, to instructing and mentoring apprentices. Most recently, Steve has been responsible for implementing the registration of Lockheed Martin’s National Standards with the Department of Veterans Affairs under the VALOR Act.