Networking is a long term game. Reach out to people and get feedback on your portfolio. Once they give you feedback, apply it and show it to them again. Do this multiple times. Build trust that you can learn and collaborate. This takes years to develop.
Won’t call your portfolio below average, but it is definitely average. A portfolio in this day and age needs to have stunning visuals and great storytelling. It needs to include only the most important parts of the journey of a project, and should be succinct enough to skim through. Your portfolio needs a lot of work on visuals, storytelling and cutting down the extensive documentation of methods and replace it with insights.
Hope this helps. All the best!