I have recently been nominated for the Jefferson Scholarship by my school. After talking to several people, the general agreement was that the fact that I was nominated for the scholarship assured me admission to the University. However, my college counselor said this was not the case… Do UVa admissions counselors know who was nominated for the scholarship, and if not, is there a way to let them know? Also, if anyone can share any information about the questions they were asked during the scholarship process, that would be great. Thanks!
I do not believe this means that you are assured admission. In fact, I know a student nominated a few years ago, that was deferred EA and then rejected. BUT, I would be interested to know if this is something that you put on your app?
Who nominated you?
My daughter was also nominated by her school for this scholarship. My understanding is that this is separate from admissions and that UVA does not know that you were nominated. That being said, UVA must have a list of nominating schools (?). It is a little confusing. I think my daughter emailed admissions to let them know that she had been nominated. She was accepted during the EA round.
My daughter had to go to somebody’s house for the first round of interviews. She sat with three interviewers and spoke about her application. They asked her questions about her essay and activities. She was called back for the second round of interviews at the same house and the conversation continued to focus on her activities, future goals, essay, classes in school, etc. They may have asked her something about her greatest achievement, etc.
They chose one student out of the 20 (?) or so who were called back for the second interview. That one student (not my daughter) went to Virginia to participate in the final round. My daughter said that this boy won the award- she did say that he was very, very impressive. Good luck!
The applications are very separate. Getting nominated for the Jefferson scholarship does not guarantee admission to UVA. In fact I noticed in past years that as the scholarship process went on, nominees that were rejected from UVA had to inform the scholarship group that they were longer eligible.
Congratulations!
Yours is a common question that the Jefferson Scholars Foundation (which is independent of the University) covers in their FAQs: http://www.jeffersonscholars.org/ask-question
Not only does it not guarantee admission it also does not seem to help. Our school is about 50/50 on nominees getting accepted. Our scholarship committee seems to look for different things than UVA. My son was selected for our school and was accepted EA but didn’t get awarded any money despite getting large merit offers from other schools that offer to less people. His was 2 years ago so I don’t remember details but it was not anything unusual or tricky pretty straight forward. My daughter has better stats and she isn’t applying for our school because she thinks it’s bad luck after last years nominee didn’t get accepted plus the school makes them write like 4 extra essays 
We usually have around 30 people apply from our school to get the nom.
Consolidated the same thread from multiple forums
@acdchai, the nomination isn’t bad luck. It’s just a completely separate process from ours. We only know about a nomination if the student sends us an update. A list of finalists, the students the foundation flies to Charlottesville for the final weekend, is shared with us before they invite them. They want to make sure all of them actually applied to UVA.