From 1983 to 1984 she was a substitute teacher with the Bibb County Board of Education in Macon, Georgia.

In 1985, she was a research assistant at the Florida State University College of Law.

From 1986 to 1987 she was a summer associate with Carlton Fields in Tampa, Florida and later an intern with the law firm of Huey Guilday Kursteiner & Tucker.

In 1993, she was nominated by Florida Governor Lawton Chiles to serve a two-year term on the Tampa Bay Regional Planning Council.

Scriven was nominated as a U.S. District Judge to the same jurisdiction by President George W. Bush on July 10, 2008, to fill a seat vacated by Patricia C. Fawsett, who assumed senior status.