By Scott Brooks

When Kelli McCarver takes notes in one of her classes at the University of Tennessee, she also posts them on a Web site that pays her to do it.

“I put everything on there,” she said. “I don’t have to waste time organizing my notes.”

McCarver discovered the site, StudyBlue.com on Facebook, another popular networking site.

“It’s like Facebook for academics,” she said.

StudyBlue.com is an “elearning” site, offering a suite of tools for students to save notes, create flashcards and participate in virtual study groups.

The company was founded in 2006 by students at the University of Wisconsin at Madison. Since then, the site has expanded to more than 1,000 colleges and universitiesand 350 high schools.

StudyBlue.com began serving U.T. back in September. Now there are over 1,600 registered members in the school’s online community.

“It’s the world’s biggest study hall,” said Ben Jedd, chief communications officer for StudyBlue.com. “Students are the most Internet-savvy users out there. This is a tool we created just for them.”

As an extra incentive, students like McCarver are also getting paid to post their notes and create flash cards as well as bring new people to the site.

“It’s really easy,” McCarver said. “For people who go to class all the time, it’s a great way to make a little money. For people who don’t always make it to class, the notes help them too.”

McCarver is a senior majoring in Psychology and plans to attend Nursing school in the fall.

“I made $100 in one week. It’s great!”

Jedd said the rewards program is a trial effort to get students to see the value of the tools available on the site.

The company pays $25 for every 25 files or flashcards provided by a student. They also pay $1 for every new user referred and 50 cents every time another student clicks on their notes.

Jedd said feedback has been mostly positive, even from professors who realize that students who miss class would likely copy someone else’s notes anyway.

As of now, the rewards program is being funded by a private investor. But in the future, Jedd said some of the services on the site will likely become “premium” for paying members only.

“But we expect the notes and flash cards will always remain free,” he said.

“There is a lot of potential out there. Academic space is really underused on the Internet,” Jedd said.

“We’ll see where it goes from here.

For more information on the service, visit www.StudyBlue.com.