@pmmywest – Two likely reasons: (1) Emory admissions decided to nominate you anyway which is plausible or (2) you fit in the group of non finalists that get early notification along with a non Scholars merit award.
Schools know that getting notified early is excellent marketing. IE Dartmouth has a long tradition of sending “Likely Letters” to its most competitive applicants.
You are probably in for good news. Congrats!
@pualum I won’t get my hopes up too much, but it would be beyond awesome if you were right about either of those options!
Hello, I also received a notification about the Scholars Program even though I had no idea I was in the running for it. I applied to Emory RD through the QuestBridge program and did not write any Emory supplements or essays regarding this scholarship.
@Hoang34 when did you submit your app? You didn’t have to write any essays for the program, you just had to indicate interest in it.
@pmmywest and @Hoang34 : Perhaps Emory is trying something new to attempt to get a better class which makes sense. On top of allowing self-nominations, they are basically nominating some applicants themselves. IE, they are doing the same as many other non-Ivy top ranked schools do, throwing money at top applicants, something Emory should have tried years ago considering its endowment. Clearly it has done some schools well. Vanderbilt raised their scores via fin. aid and WashU apparently threw scholarships and grants at students as well. It is a clever way to get top students who would not consider the school if they had to pay all of the tuition, to at least take a second look. In addition, I think Emory is beginning a scholarship initiative, perhaps some of this is a part of what may come out of the program. It is about time they came up with something because Emory is the same caliber (undergrad and many graduate programs as well) as schools ranked about 16-20 and yet the scores have lagged a lot for quite a while. To me this seems to have come from being too conservative with financial aid for middle class students and being overly stingy with the scholars program (in comparison to schools with similar or lesser endowments). In no way would higher scores actually result in a different academic environment (because scores at these schools are already extremely high vs. the national average and most 4 year colleges), but I suppose it would certainly make us look better. One would also hope that they try to recruit based upon interests (maybe more pure science, social science, and humanities as opposed to pre-profs. Or recruiting people who already have very high talent in specific areas as measured by something more than high school grades and standardized exams) and things like that. Those are things that can enhance the academic environment while also doing more to increase superficial/prestige driven measurements.
@pmmywest I forwarded my QuestBridge application to Emory sometime during the beginning half of December well after the November 15 deadline. As I did not submit a Common App, I did not indicate my interest in the Scholars program. I guess we will wait and see.
Since Questbridge partner universities guarantee to provide full scholarships to Questbridge accepted applicants I would assume Emory automatically enters all Questbridge applicants into the scholars pool since it is where full scholarships are awarded.
To clarify, a QuestBridge applicant who later became a Finalist has notified me that Emory automatically puts QuestBridge Regular Decision applicants into the Scholars pool, I guess this is a little unfair considering this usually happens after the November 15th deadline but to counterbalance this, the QuestBridge applications were all due at the end of September and no change could be made to them from then until December when they were forwarded to Emory so I guess it all works out equally.
Wow . . . just released today, a big spike in applications this year for both Emory and Oxford Colleges. Acceptance rates will be much lower vs. last year. See link:
http://news.emory.edu/stories/2015/01/er_undergraduate_admissions_applications/campus.html
We regret to inform you that you are not among the group of finalists who have been selected. This year’s pool of over 6,000 scholar nominees was particularly competitive, representing some of the top students in the world.
Not selected
2260 SAT
710 Bio
730 Math II
750 US Hist
3.97 UW GPA
Naitonal Merit Commended
5’s on 4 AP’s
AP Scholar with Honor
Etc, Etc, Etc.
“On behalf of the Emory University Admission Committee, it is our pleasure to inform you that you have been
admitted to both Emory College and Oxford College! The Emory University Scholars Program Selection
Committee is also pleased to inform you that you are one of the few students selected to receive an Emory
Merit Achievement Award (EMAA), contingent on enrolling at Oxford College. EMAA is an $18,000
scholarship, renewable each year for four years with a maintained GPA of 3.2.”
Ahhhhh omg I cannot believe it!!!
There’s nothing in my OPUS account, guess that email was just a glitch then
Congradulations! Do you mind sharing your stats?
Hi. Posting w/ daughter’s info:
Accepted w/ Honors Liberal Arts Scholarship. 20,000 yr merit 
Basic info:
2300 SAT (800 CR, 720 M; 780 W)
SAT II 770 lit and 760 history
3.75 UW
top 7%
Lots of artsy leadership positions
Visited and showed interest
no hook
Good luck everyone!
Also got $20,000 a year merit! Whoo!
Wow…I think we had really decided it just wasn’t going to happen. Not a finalist for Scholars, but accepted to Emory and Oxford, with scholarship for Oxford. 
Has anyone tried to sign on to the apply.emory.edu/admitted page with their student ID yet? We tried and it didn’t work. Makes me nervous that there was a mistake made or something. :-SS Aaack Still not quite believing it!
not a finalist 
Tried yet again…this time from the link on the Oxford webpage (for the apply.emory.edu/admitted link) and it worked! Feeling relieved.
Lol I didn’t even care I wasn’t a finalist for Emory Scholars. I am so happy with my scholarship to Oxford! I’m a Questbridge finalist so I am already hoping for great financial aid. I honestly didn’t think I was going to get in. ACT 29, GPA 3.7~, AP scores five 3’s, one 4. and an average to good essay. I really think it was my strong leadership that got me in!