BT is corrected..the application is briefed by one of the Regional Admissions counselors, similar to the way Officer files are briefed by selection boards. The Admissions Board simply votes up or down on qualification for Admission (i.e qualified or not). That is one of the Q's in 3Q (CFA and Medical being the others), Once determined 3Q, another part of the Admissions office works to assign qualified candidates to available nominations. A couple things to remember:
1) The candidate will not know when the Admissions Board has reviewed his/her application. The BGO can tell by changes in status, but is not supposed to be telling a Candidate. The Admissions Board review is not necessarily within weeks of submission.
2) 3Q and a "nomination" is not necessarily an appointment. It is important to know and understand what type of nomination you have. Many (most ?) MOC use a competitive nomination process , nominating up to 10 candidates for each available position, and letting Admissions decide whom among the qualified candidates gets the Appointment. (There are several variations --some MOC rank their candidates). IMO, this is really the biggest funnel - a head to head competition for available positions, usually withing your MOC slate. That is why it is so important to apply for every nomination source you qualify for --this gives Admissions more options in finding a spot for you.
3) In my experience --watching the process for over 15 years, the selection among the MOC slate is probably the biggest factor in timing of Appointments. Keep in mind that Admissions cannot make the decision until they have the application of all candidates. If you get your application in early, Admissions still needs to wait until the application of the candidate who completed his application in January tis reviewed before making the decision. (This is not intended to discourage getting your application in early -- the final decision on whom to award the Appointment may turn on intangibles such as interest and motivation).
Bottom line, be patient ..there is a well established process and it takes time... once your application is submitted, don't expect to hear anything until late March/early April. If you hear something earlier, that's great, but until you see a TWE you are still in the competition.
He plans to re-apply if it wont happened this time. And yes, the application is open until January, but it says it's a rolling admission and encourage to apply early, so we did as early as we could, but i guess it doesn't matter much. Wanted to share our experience to see if someone feels the same.