By: Dave Scheiber
Brittany Devlin has a favorite quote that captures her guiding philosophy in life – one that helps explain how she has launched an innovative and wildly successful STEM program at Bradenton’s Southeast High, a Title 1 school attended by many at-risk students.
Or how – after a sharp decline in entries due to the pandemic in 2020 – she has breathed new life into the Manatee County Science Fair as its passionate regional director.
"None of this would exist without the mentorship, encouragement and vision that the USF Educational Leadership program instilled in me." – Brittany Devlin
For the high school biology teacher and 2025 USF Educational Leadership and Administration graduate, it all comes down to Thomas Edison’s famous words embedded at the end of all her emails: “Our greatest weakness lies in giving up. The most certain way to succeed is always to try just one more time.”
The fact is, Devlin could easily have given up many times growing up in a dysfunctional family that, by her count, moved more than 50 times in her childhood because, she says, her parents were evicted from places so often in the Sarasota area. Living in a household rife with drugs and alcohol, she frequently lived in destitute conditions with her identical twin sister and younger sister, and the only reprieve came when they occasionally moved in with their grandparents.
“We were at-risk, and below the poverty line,” Devlin recalls. “My sisters and I have always been very close, and the biggest source of stability we had was my maternal grandparents while my parents figured things out. We would go back and forth, kind of ping-ponging.”
Rather than give up, however, they took the graduate equivalency exam when they turned 18, moved to an apartment on their own, worked multiple part-time jobs at Sarasota Square Mall and gradually began to turn around their lives.
After seven long years, Devlin managed to earn both her community college A.A. and her bachelor’s degree from the TV, with a heavy focus on biology. It was at USF, surrounded by many other bright students, that she realized she had to put forth a greater effort. Academics had always come easy in spite of her many challenges, but now she had to work hard to achieve her goals.
“I did struggle at first, partly because I was older than the other students and I had a baby,” she says. “I couldn’t do a lot of the fun things other students did with clubs and socializing, and I had an hour’s drive every day to the Tampa campus.”
Devlin at graduation with her twin sister and younger sister
By now, Devlin was married and living in Bradenton, and she buckled down and earned her undergraduate degree in 2018. After so much of her life spent moving from place to place, she finally had a chance to settle down and enjoy some stability. But the problem was she didn’t know what she would do. “My husband said, ‘Hey, you don’t have to keep moving – you can relax and stay in one place now,’ ” she says.
Devlin did just that. Thanks to an animal behavior class she took as a USF junior, she developed a strong interest in scientific research, encouraged by her professor, Deby Cassill. “I worked with her and she just supported me in the most loving, mom kind of way that I had never had before,” Devlin says.
That support led her to become a substitute middle school teacher in Bradenton, and she fell in love with teaching science and showing students averse to the topic that it could be fun and interesting.
Then came a turning-point moment. A student came to her with a heavy family issue and she felt compelled to call Child Protective Services. The situation hit home with Devlin and left her reeling with emotions from her past.
“I remember sitting there at the end of the school day just feeling so exhausted and staring out of the office window,” she recollects. “And my assistant principal came up to me and asked, ‘Are you okay?’ I was like, ‘I don’t know what to do with this. I’m supposed to act like everything is fine?’ I didn’t ever have anyone who stuck up for me, and now I was on the other side.”
“But he said, ‘Well, you know, you could be the person for these kids that you never had. You could help them with the advocacy that you didn’t have.’ And it just clicked in my mind. All the pieces snapped together. I can do the science – check. I can help the kids with science fair projects – check. And I can advocate for those who can’t advocate for themselves – single, double, triple check. That’s me. That is now my life.”
Today, she utilizes her life experiences – facing and overcoming challenges, and not giving up – to better connect with high school science students who might otherwise struggle with the subject and move on. Her mission to help strengthen their understanding of scientific methods has evolved into a full-fledged program, Southeast Research, in only its first year. And it has become a flourishing, district-recognized initiative with 155 students enrolled across multiple levels of the International Baccalaureate program.
“The students get to work with people at Lockheed Martin and NOAA and NIH on projects,” she said. “I have the students come to class and pick a topic – something that interests them – and I teach them how to research it, how to read a scientific journal and break it down in ways that make sense. Then I teach them how to create a CV and write a professional email to researchers around the state or country and request a Zoom meeting so they can ask questions and use them as a source of knowledge and even as mentors.”
A few of the students from Devlin's new program, Southeast Research.
The program has received local sponsorships and funding, and the school district has provided resources for classroom equipment and training. In addition, due to her endeavor, the Advancing STEM Research Teaching (ASRT) Program has selected the Manatee County School District as one of only eight nationwide to participate. And Devlin was invited to speak at the Society for Science’s National Research Teacher Conference about her administrative-buy in approach.
When Devlin took over as director of the county science fair, just before the pandemic in 2018, the number of participants had dipped to 30. That number has now grown to 347 in the regional competition. And it’s expanded from only including three middle schools to 10, while the number of high schools has increased from one to four.
“Ms. Devlin has enabled access for students across all demographic and socioeconomic backgrounds to have authentic, hands-on scientific inquiry-based learning opportunities,” said Southeast High School Principal Ginger L. Collins. “She has written multiple grants to find funding for durable equipment and renewable materials that support multi-year, sustainable research opportunities in biology, environmental science, marine science, neuroscience and data-driven investigations. What she provides for our students is priceless and we are fortunate she is a Seminole.”
In a recent email to her USF College of Education professors, Devlin expressed her deep gratitude:
“None of this would exist without the mentorship, encouragement and vision that the USF Educational Leadership program instilled in me. Your classes didn’t just prepare me to lead, they gave me the tools to build something lasting, scalable and deeply meaningful. I carry your lessons into every new challenge, every student success and every conversation that reminds me why we do what we do.
“Thank you for your investment in me. I hope this update serves as a reminder that what you do every day matters. The impact of your work continues to ripple outward in ways you might not always get to see.”
And perhaps the greatest impact is the powerful lesson she imparts to her students and that has guided her in life: don’t give up.
Devlin was one of four Southeast High School teachers to recieve a state scholastic grant from Church of the Redeemer this year.