Standing out Young, in all ramifications and not regarding barriers is not an easy task to embark on,but Record breaking Brittney Exline paved her way through to success as she graduates at a very tender age. she has been remarkable from her secondary school days as she was Age 15 when she became the youngest African-American female accepted into an Ivy League school, the University of Pennsylvania (Penn).
Exline has made history once again as the school’s youngest engineer and the nation’s youngest African-American engineer. The 19-year-old recently graduated cum laude, earning her bachelor’s degree in computer science. Already, she’s landed a job with a software company outside of Boston.
She said “I’m a little bit nervous,I’m sure I’ll be fine. Being 19 doesn’t bother me. It’s just being fresh out of college and having a new transition.”
Exline, speaks Spanish, French, Japanese, Russian, Arabic and German, doubled her loads to graduate in four years with minors in math, psychology and classical studies. “I’ve never had less than five classes,” she said. “But I’ve had as many as 6.5 classes. I just made sure I had time to study. I went into the engineering school undeclared. I didn’t want to do chemical engineering. Computer science is a lot more theoretical and closer to math. I liked that part. It’s more abstract. That contributed to my strength.”
Volunteerism is her passion. Exline didn’t waste time finding ways to give back. During her college years, she worked with Community School Student Partnerships in Philadelphia and became a member of the senior staff and a site coordinator for West Philadelphia High School, where she trained and mentored 30 tutors from Penn.“It was compelling to me. I’m interested in education,” said Exline, who also worked as a kindergarten summer school teacher for Freedom Schools of Philadelphia. “There are a lot of things that need to be done. When I get the chance to go into that, I will make a difference.”
She hopes to return to school to earn a master’s degree but isn’t bubbling over at the thoughts of earning a doctorate. “I don’t have any burning research questions I want to study for six or seven years.”
For right now, Exline is concerned with figuring out a way to do something that she’s avoided for a long time: learning how to drive.
“I didn’t need to learn in Philly; I used public transportation. Also, I didn’t really want to learn that badly,” she said. “I was hoping to get a job in an area where I didn’t have to learn how to drive. I have to learn now, being outside of Boston, because it isn’t as accessible with public transportation.”
