How should a high-school student approach professors in research institutions about research opportunities? I am a high schooler who lives in the vicinity of many premier research institutions and am very interested in going into STEM. I know that I will have to ask a lot of professors to let me work under them before one agrees, so I was wondering how I could go about asking several professors.
I know that I will need to write a proper email for each one, not a mass email that I can just copy-paste. Another issue I thought about is if by some chance two professors agree to have me. What do I do then? How can I avoid that situation?
It might be better, if you can arrange it, to have one of your teachers help you with this. It may well be that one of your STEM teachers went to one of these universities, or has some contact there. If so, they can help you make contact, vouch for your seriousness, and ease the way.
This is much harder now in the pandemic, but perhaps it can be arranged in virtual space. A phone call from a teacher to a professor before you make contact will make all the difference. Even if none of your teachers have any contacts, a mail from them, introducing an &quot;interesting student&quot; will make your contact much more likely to bear fruit. Make sure that your teacher can say some interesting things about you and your interests and skills.
This should avoid the &quot;bulk&quot; problem and you can approach it one step at a time.