What would you do with $25,000?

One wall of the office is covered with lists like "What we LOVE about us" and "Chris' ideal workplace." The conference room's whiteboard shows a recent brainstorming session under the header "Ways To Make Meetings Fun."

If this doesn't sound like a typical corporate workplace, that's because it's not. This is the office of recent Stern School of Business graduates Jamie Briones and Chris Mirabile - and they want to make having "the best social life possible" an organized and simple reality.

CollegeHotList.com, a college-exclusive social networking site, launched in September 2006 when Briones and Mirabile were seniors. The original idea belonged to Gianni Martire, a 2005 graduate of Loyola College in Maryland, whose roommate, Andrew Savino, was longtime friends with Mirabele. The site was created to complement and compete with the massively popular social networking site, Facebook.com. Although only a few hundred people were e-mailed about the launch, the site boasted 2,500 members within the first few weeks.

In response to the site's popularity, the four founders decided to enter their idea in the Stern Berkley Center for Entrepreneurial Studies prestigious Business Plan Competition. They won the contest in spring 2007, splitting a $50,000 prize with another team. They were later accepted to the Berkley Center's "Incubator," which offers office space, mentoring, legal counsel and administrative help to the blooming companies of Stern students or alumni.

Less than a year later, the group has moved into an office in "Silicon Alley," an area in Lower Manhattan that houses several new internet and media companies. However, they still retain another office in Carlyle Court residence hall, courtesy of the Incubator. What started in a dorm is now a professional team of about 20 people, including several NYU interns and a group of computer programmers from the Courant Institute of Mathematical Sciences.

"The site really is student-built. So many people have come on with ideas," said CollegeHotList.com manager and NYU graduate Beth Pollack. "It really is almost like a student project."

The group plans to launch their revamped site within the next two months for students in New York City-area schools. If the venture is successful, they hope to expand to different cities.

Unlike Facebook, CollegeHotList.com intends to remain a college student-only website. They will give students more privacy and allow users to see what social or cultural events are "hot" with people who are their friends or share their interests - without the worry of parents, professors or 14-year-olds.

"We love Facebook. We use Facebook. But the important thing is we created this because Facebook isn't meant to do this," Pollack said.

Strict privacy settings will make sure only approved people can see what events a CollegeHotList.com member will be attending.

"Everyone is signing in with their college e-mail addresses," Mirabile said. "So it's going to be a much more safe environment."

Users will be able to begin using the site by doing a "Facebook import," which will automatically download information, like profile pictures from a new user's Facebook account, Mirabile said.

Then, students can display and rate what's happening on their campus or in their city and see what their friends are doing. Users can also create categorized "HotLists" of events they want to attend and enter their plans into social calendars that can be shared with approved viewers.

"The cool thing about CollegeHotList is you can see what the night is going to be like before you make your decisions," Pollack said.

The business venture is currently funded by the Berkley Center's grant and some of the founders' own money, but they expect to make money from ads on the site that will target the college demographic.

Eventually, Mirabile hopes that CollegeHotList.com will be easily accessible by cell phone, although the group hasn't ironed out all of the details just yet. But no matter what, they're sticking to their original game plan - college exclusivity and effortless social coordination.

"We'll help you find it, plan it, do it," Pollack said.

Robyn Baitcher is deputy university editor. E-mail her at business@nyunews.com.