How one student used cold emailing to land an internship

A few weeks ago, I got an email from one of our BETA Camp alums, Fathima.

💻 She’s now a freshman at UC Berkeley, where she’s majoring in electrical engineering and computer science (the same degree Steve Wozniak got!).

In her email, she shared how BETA Camp transformed the way she thought about networking and cold outreach.

The skills she learned with us have helped her:

• Build valuable connections

• Grow her business

• Land an internship

There is so much to learn from Fathima’s story. 🧠

The best way to encourage teen goal-setting is with cold, hard cash. 💰

And we’re not talking about their allowance.

At BETA Camp this fall, your teen will start a business under the mentorship of rockstar instructors and collaborate with ultra-ambitious peers.

Get them into a tribe that will light a fire under their –ahem– future. 🔥

Enrollments close Sep 17. Space is limited. Get on it.

Fathima’s story — and how cold-emailing can change your kid’s life

Fathima joined BETA Camp to challenge herself.

🌎 “I knew that if I wanted to go do something amazing in the world, I needed to learn how to be a leader,” says Fathima.

Fathima’s startup required her to do a ton of outreach to businesses. She learned how to do it well by practicing it, again and again.

By the end of BETA camp, Fathima had gotten a crash course in cold outreach.

Then, she used those skills to land herself an internship.

🏠 Fathima interned with The Community Builders, an affordable housing organization.

And her outreach skills came in handy again, when she formed a partnership with Junior Achievement to bring a financial literacy curriculum to the housing communities. 🤝

That connection led her to landing a huge college scholarship. 💸

Then, it led to a partnership that will bring her own business, a financial literacy card game for kids, into Chicago-area schools.

One connection can lead to endless possibilities.

But even when a connection doesn’t lead to a job offer, scholarship, or business partnership (which they often do), expanding your network is inherently valuable.

“They’ll remember you,” says Fathima. “You’ll get on their radar as the kid who wanted to be a software engineer… And you never know where that connection could lead.”

Cold outreach was a total game-changer for Fathima. Here’s how your kids can do the same. 👇

How to write cold emails and land exciting opportunities

The first step is to figure out who to reach out to.

🥅 Make sure your kids have some goals in mind. What is it they want to learn? What organizations do they want to work with? What is their mission?

🤝 The purpose of cold outreach isn’t just to make your kid’s resume look more impressive – it’s to connect with people who align with their interests and values.

Fathima was passionate about urban planning, but didn’t know of many opportunities for youth to get involved with it. So instead of waiting until she was a college grad, she decided to reach out to The Community Builders for an internship!

Once your kid knows who to reach out to, they need to find a contact.

🌎 Let’s say your kid wants to talk to a software engineer at Google. Fathima’s advice? “Don’t just pick one.” The more people you reach out to, the higher the chance you’ll get responses.

She recommends starting your search on LinkedIn. 👇

• Type the company name into the search bar

• Choose the “people” category

• Set the job title to “software engineer”

• Marvel at your huge list of contacts 👏

Next, it’s time to pull out some handy tech tools.

Fathima recommends:

✔️Apollo.io for getting email addresses from LinkedIn profiles.

✔️MergeMail for sending customized mass emails.

✔️Calendly for making scheduling a breeze.

“It’s the little things that make you seem more professional,” says Fathima. “As a kid, that’s a huge way to stand out right off the bat.”

Now, it’s time to write the email itself!

Every email Fathima sends follows the same format:

1. Quick intro: Who are you? Where are you studying? Fathima recommends emphasizing the angle of being a youth looking to learn.

2. Why you’re emailing: Whether that’s to learn how someone got into their position or to explore a partnership, be clear.

3. The ask: “If you’re just pitching yourself, they won’t know what to do with that information,” says Fathima. “I always bold the ask and make it no more than one sentence long.”

Once you’ve sent the first email, don’t forget to follow up.

“It took me like seven follow-ups to get the CEO of Community Builders to respond to me about the internship,” says Fathima. She recommends following up every 2-3 days.

So your kid landed a meeting through cold email — now what?!

Before the meeting, make sure your kid really does their homework.

💭 Fathima says: “Research the person: where did they go to school? What experience do they have? What other jobs have they worked?”

🤖 Getting stuck? Use AI. Fathima copy and pastes information from LinkedIn and prompts ChatGPT to come up with a list of relevant interview questions.

Whatever you do, don’t skip this step. ❌

The only time a networking call went badly for Fathima? When she wasn’t prepared.

“Really obvious questions get really obvious responses,” says Fathima. So if you want to have interesting conversations, do your research!

When the meeting is over, send a thank-you email and periodically check in with the contact.

Your kid should keep them up-to-date on where they’re at — especially if their contact helped them get there.

This shows they’re not just reaching out only when they need a favor — your kid is building an actual relationship.

This is how you grow a powerful network that you can leverage whenever you need it.

📹 Watch: The fundamentals of networking, for kids

Find out how we teach kids at Prequel the art of networking.w we teach kids in Prequel the art of networking.

Thanks for reading!

Until next time,

Ivy

CEO Prequel, BETA Camp, Apollo

Follow my journey on LinkedIn