By Michelle Cleveland > University of Maryland, College Park

Study hard, party harder. That’s the mantra of many college students today. But these three students took their college experience to the next level, using innovative thinking to get a head start on the real world.

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While buying furniture his freshman year, Scott Palmer, a senior communications major at Northeastern University, came up with the idea to invent an inflatable beer pong table. This led to  “Poolside Pong,” an inflatable raft with built-in cupholders in pong formation, and a new company, Redefyne Industries, which Scott developed alongside his friend Drew Harrington, a senior construction management major at the Wentworth Institute of Technology.

Palmer and Harrington have only been selling the inflatable beer pong table for four months and have sold over 2,500 units.

“[Pong] is one of the most popular games in the United States I think,” Palmer says. In fact, he claims that late twenty-somethings in the financial industry have been some of his and Harrington’s biggest clients.

Recently, Poolside Pong was voted the weekly million-dollar idea by program viewers on Sept. 26 on CNN’s “The Big Idea with Donny Deutsch.”

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Another student who uses his brain for more than just passing exams is Caleb Brown, a senior computer information systems major at California University of Pennsylvania.

Brown developed a website for college students that allows users to create a profile within their school and swap movies with others on campus. Flickhoppr, the name of his web-based innovation, is completely free and encourages students, especially freshmen, to meet new people, Brown said.

Brown admits that getting the word out has been challenging so far, but he thinks that the concept of borrowing movies and meeting new people can spread quickly, especially among freshmen.

“Flickhoppr has been my baby for years now, and I am quite attached to it,” he says. Flickhoppr takes a social networking site and combines it with a DVD rental site like Netflix–and it’s completely free. He developed the website in his spare time using his own resources and plans to continue building web applications and run and pursuing his own business ideas after he graduates.

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Michael Englisch, who graduated from Drexel University in September with a degree in business and a concentration in marketing, exploded into the business world when he developed Helix Drinks, a new kind of energy drink that comes as dehydrated, Kool-Aid-like powder.

Englisch and his business partner, John Caporaso, financial backer of Helix and owner of Nupack Consulting, generated this idea about a year ago based on a common interest in “stick packs,” thin, light, stick-shaped packaging sleeves. Each Helix pack contains a full energy drink in a tiny, nearly weightless paper sleeve. Just add water. Says Englisch, “It’s inexpensive compared to alternatives, it doesn’t have to be refrigerated, it’s easy to carry or throw in a backpack and just go. Water is everywhere.”

English handles the public side of the company while Caporoso, who has made his career in food packaging and research, focuses on the technical, formulaic work. Since he graduated this past summer, Helix Drinks has been Englisch’s full-time job.

They just started selling the drink packs three-and-a-half months ago and have sold about 5,000 individual units.

“It’s still in its infancy so we haven’t seen any huge boom yet, but I’ll tell you when that day comes I’ll be jumping for joy,” Englisch says.

He admits, though, that his last semester of college wasn’t easy. Helix Drinks had its product then, so Englisch was pitching his drink constantly, while still trying to keep up with classes.

“That, coupled up with of course senioritis, was not a healthy combination,” Englisch jokes. While originally working on the business plan, he said school actually opened his eyes, and that talking to professors and getting their opinions was a great support system.

Says Englisch, “There are plenty of students who have the ability, who have the brains, but just don’t think they can do it because of what popular culture tells them. Everyone tells you, you have to go out, you have to get a job and you have to pay the bills. But there’s other ways to do it. If you have the motivation, if you have the mindset, you can definitely start your own company before graduating.”