Kaggle is for engineers quiet honestly. Its not meant for researchers

Competition is there , you need to prove you are competent in either way . Speak to those who have done phd in CS understand perspectives most importantly if you have or develop research aptitude you dont need a phd degree 5 yrs in school would be waste of time. MS with thesis should suffice , in US there are lot of applied scientist roles which take undergrads . The country i come from has just 5-10% opportunities in research compared to US & salary is horrible

Applied science internship, research assistant @ ivy leagues . First you need to speak to a professor via email presenting ya portfolio that how your research under his supervision will provide value to him , for that you need to research papers publication as evidence & then if professor agrees to advise to you , go thru the formalities. If you want to work with anyone its two way street it needs to benfit both the people often called WIN-WIN situation. Consider yourself lucky being in US a land of opportunities for STEM . Good luck

You can apply for pre doc roles in US

Apply for research internship roles . That might help , narrow down ya research topic , get acquainted with skillset like ml dl nlp pt python , get some kaggle ranking most importantly you need to exhibit research aptitude to professors