Published October 28, 2026.
Email the person who would actually supervise you, about a project they are already doing, and ask for one thing. A week later, follow up once. If the inbox stays quiet, stop refreshing it and apply to a program that already assigns mentors. A summer spent waiting on a famous professor is a summer with no lab.
The email
Four lines. Your grade and school. The specific paper or project, not “I love your research.” What you can do this month, which for most high school students is read, clean data, or help with a defined task, not design the study. The ask: a 20-minute conversation, or whether the group takes high school students at all.
Parents should not send this. A note from a parent tells the lab the student will not write their own updates. The student sends it from a plain email address, with a one-page resume attached.
The full version of the note, including what not to attach, is in how to cold email a professor. Programs that already have a mentor and a deadline are on the research deadline list. Start there if the student has not done research before. A cold email is the path when a program does not fit, not the first path.
Questions families ask
Who should a student email?
The person who would actually supervise the work. That is often a graduate student or a lab manager, not the most famous name on the department page. Read one recent paper or project from that group so the email is about their work.
How long should the email be?
Short enough to read on a phone. Who you are, one sentence on why their work, one sentence on what you can do, and a specific ask. Attach a one-page resume. Do not attach a five-page research proposal.
When do you follow up?
Once, about a week later, on the same thread. If there is still no answer, write to a different person. Three follow-ups to the same professor is not persistence. It is noise.
What if no one replies?
Use a program that already has mentors, instead of waiting on a cold email. The free research deadline list is the set of programs with a real application and a date.
Sources
- EduAvenues research program deadlines, the list of programs with dates checked against each official site. Use it when a cold email is the wrong first move.