BarCamp Conway is just a couple of weeks or so away.

The 2012 event is set for June 2 at the UCA College of Business. So far, 164 attendees are registered. Check out more info — and register — here.

Jeannette Balleza of the ARK accelerator (an IA project) will present a session on startup community  development. If you’re an aspiring entrepreneur, high-tech or not, you’ll want to be there for that.

Here’s some updates from the Conway organizers:

Appcelerator is giving away 2 Kindle Fires. We’re going to have a photo booth setup. Yarnell’s is going to be giving away free ice cream. We’ve got a bunch of free schwag we’re giving away. We just placed the shirt order. Stickers should be in today. We’re placing the lanyard order today. BarCamp Tour is going to be giving away commemorative pint glasses at the after party.

Things that are free at BarCampConway: EVERYTHING. Why wouldn’t you attend?

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For those unfamiliar with BarCamp, it has gone nationwide (it being BAD, after all). Here’s some info about it from the Conway site:

What is a BarCamp?

A BarCamp is a participatory “un-conference” event, where the attendees are in charge of what happens. We provide all the basic needs, and hope that people interested in teaching and learning in an open environment come together to share their knowledge and experience.

What kinds of presentations should I expect?

We don’t know. It all depends on you. Are you a developer? Designer? Robotics nerd? Computer Science geek? Talk about what you know. All of you – the passionate people who are driving innovation – are part of the culture that drives BarCamp and we can’t wait to see you!

For you old schoolers who need more info, the number to call is 501-291-1727.

Innovate Arkansas held its latest technology showcase for client firms on Wednesday from the Arkansas Research & Technology Park in Fayetteville.

IA holds these events quarterly, or therebouts, to afford three client firms an opportunity — 15 minutes or so — to pitch to potential investors and answer questions.

This latest lineup of clients was an impressive one, each seemingly poised for big things. Seriously, big things. As in successful exits at the very least.

Red Clay, based in Bentonville, has created a crowd-sourcing platform for the home decor industry that it hopes to expand to other areas.

Here’s the premise — Red Clay creates the community of home decor designers, for example, who compete for projects submitted by retailers.

You know how Arkansas Business profiles an IA client each month on its Innovate page? (Just nod and smile…) Well, Red Clay was the profile in July of last year. Better yet, visit the Red Clay site for more info on this unique venture.

APGR Green — which will be profiled in AB on June 4, by the way — has channeled Carl from Caddyshack. Don’t worry, it’s not blowing up golf courses in Ahab-like quests for gophers. Rather, it has developed a humane and green way to eradicate the “varmits,” and fire ants, too.

The Fayetteville startup has developed a prototype system to flood gopher holes and ant mounds with carbon dioxide, which displaces oxygen and essentially puts the critters to sleep. It’s patent-pending and EPA-approved. Read more in June.

EKrowd, profiled in AB just last month, is moving forward and almost ready for launch. Its crowd-based model allows individuals to team up to make group buys. Ekrowd, according to founder Chris Brown, flips the supply and demand model.

If you can generate a demand — that is, enough folks who want the same thing you do, then eKrowd (technically, it’s a lower-case ‘e’ — oh, these young whippersnappers with their non-capitalized names and such…) does the rest by negotiating a discounted price.

It’s really very, very cool. Be ready to hear more about this Fayetteville startup once it launches officially, perhaps around the first of June.

Thanks to our friends at the Arkansas Science & Technology Authority for sharing an update below about what’s going on at the STEM Academy at UAPB.

America, it seems, is falling behind in areas related to math and science. Indeed, we’ve become a nation of dummy algebra students. And that’s not so good in a growing, high-tech global economy.

From Gov. Beebe on down, state officials sing the praises of STEM, and rightly so. (Who needs more bloggers, right?) The academy at UAPB was started in 2003 and is funded by NSF grants to foster STEM at historically black colleges and universities. The UAPB program targets students from eight school districts in the Pine Bluff area.

Here’s more from UAPB:

The STEM Program consists of personal growth, research, study skills, and related activities to assist students to complete a degree in the STEM areas while attending UAPB. Key components include a summer academy, a mentoring program, research, and revised STEM courses.

STEM students will be guided and advised by their major advisor throughout the academic year. They will carry a course load of 15 to 18 hours per semester.

We mentioned an update…Here’s a link to videos produced by ASTA highlighting the program. And here’s a tip of the hat to everyone involved with laying a foundation for high-tech entrepreneurs in a region of the state that sometimes gets overshadowed in terms of entrepreneurship and economic development.

Given the recent economic development activity at Pine Bluff Arsenal and the public-private collaboration taking place at NCTR, and the potential impact on future development at Jefferson County’s Bioplex, perhaps the tide is beginning to turn in southeast Arkansas.

And perhaps many of the students who go through the STEM Academy at UAPB will be help bring that turn about.

Vivione Biosciences is taking over about 2,000-SF of lab space at the Pine Bluff Arsenal.

Read the story from Arkansas Business here.

Local officials hope Vivione’s presence at the lab and its collaboration with neighboring NCTR will one day lead to a biotech cluster originating out of Pine Bluff. Vivione’s expansion to the arsenal promises many future, good — great — jobs for the area, long stuck in the shadow of Little Rock and NWA in terms of economic development.

Vivione is the IA client whose rapid-B technology can, among other things, detect food pathogens in minutes or hours as opposed to days or longer. There are other applications –  chemical, defense-oriented — that make the move to the arsenal a logical one.

Here’s video from Arkansas Business news partner KTHV.

More big news for an Arkansas tech-based startup. The momentum continues to build…