Jeff Varner

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Survivor contestant

Jeff Varner
Date of birth	April 16, 1966
Resides	Greensboro, North Carolina
Season(s)	Australia
Finish	7th Voted out
Tribe(s)	Kucha, Barramundi

Jeff Varner (born April 16, 1966) is a news anchor, a former entertainment reporter, and a former contestant on the TV show Survivor.

1 Early Life and Education
2 Participation in Survivor
3 Journalism career
4 External links

[edit] Early Life and Education

Jeff was raised on a tobacco farm in Greensboro, North Carolina. He played right defense for a hockey team in the local youth hockey league. He participated in Tae Kwon Do classes soon after. He attended Southern Guilford High School, where he was active in student government and theatre arts. He later went on to earn a journalism degree from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

[edit] Participation in Survivor

Jeff was a contestant on Survivor: The Australian Outback, 2001. He was a member of the Kucha tribe, and made it to the merge, but not the core group of nine, as there was a tie between him and Colby Donaldson. At the time, in the event of a tie, previous tribal council votes would be used. Jeff had two but knew only of one, Colby had zero.

Tina Wesson once referred to him as a "little devil" because he delighted in tormenting his opposition.

During the show, Jeff's luxury item was a coloring book and a set of crayons. The Survivors colored in the books and signed their autograph in it, and after the show, he sold the pictures on Ebay to raise money for charities.

[edit] Journalism career

Jeff worked as an entertainment reporter for KCBS in Los Angeles, CA then E! News Live, and then as a field correspondent and host for the TV Guide Channel. He is now a weekend news anchor and field reporter at FOX 8 WGHP in High Point, North Carolina. In his first year in broadcast news, he won two Associated Press Broadcast News Awards: "Best Health Report," for a story on recognizing stroke quickly, and the Associated Press "Rookie of the Year," both for 2005^{[citation needed]}.

Jeff began his career in communications as a public relations assistant and corporate communications manager for Citicorp in New York City. He was part of the first team in the corporate world to utilize the internet to communicate project information as a manager in Citicorp's "Product Design and Development Division."

He used that background to transition into web development, working in developing web properties for Citibank, MCI, Harlequin Romance, and Martha Stewart Living Online^{[citation needed]}. Jeff used his Survivor exposure to turn his web and PR career into a a full-blown on-camera reporter, anchor and host.