Innovation Index: Women in tech, Iowa's investment landscape and more startup news for Nov. 15

We Create Here was an initiative within the Gazette Company to develop evolving narratives and authentic conversations throughout Iowa's Creative Corridor. read more

Welcome to the Innovation Index! Each week, we'll round up links and stories from around the web relating to startups, innovation and entrepreneurship in Iowa's Creative Corridor and around the state. You can help! Email me news and notes.

Plus, a new way to read this curated feature – check out wecreatehere.net/innovation-index. Better? Worse? Indifferent? Let me know.

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News and Notes:

• Check out Eric Engelmann and Andy Stoll of the Iowa Startup Accelerator representing Iowa in Washington DC. Several Corridorians visited for a SBA conference on startups.

• 'Women of Innovation' honored: The Technology Association of Iowa honored women from academia, startups and established tech companies in their annual awards ceremony. The winners include:
  • Amy Lee, University of Iowa
  • Peggy Watkins, Boone High School
  • Renee Cole, University of Iowa
  • Lisa Gran, Splashlight
  • Susan Wood, VIDA Diagnostics, Inc.
  • Sophia Walsh, Cerro Gordo County Department of Public Health
  • Ini Augustine, SocialWise Media Group
  • Beth Hochstedler, University of Iowa
  • Student Winners: Krysti Knoche, University of Iowa, Kayla De Weerd, Boyden-Hull Community School,

    Read more via the Technology Association of Iowa and the Des Moines Register. Congrats to all!

• More good stuff for women in tech: the Iowa Tech Chicks hosted their second Girls Tech Career Day, exposing 16 fifth- to eigth-grade girls to careers in various aspects of the tech industry. Check out one adorable outcome on the right.

• Our friends at Silicon Prairie News have a new, in-depth report on the state of funding for startups in Iowa. Read and share here. The series is ongoing, with features on Higher Learning Technologies and TelePharm published so far.
• Congrats to the Cedar Falls/Waterloo crew for hosting "Up The Valley," yesterday, bringing together startup community builders from around the state to discuss growing more startups in the valley. Our friends to the north are gearing up with a new Open Coffee meetup, 1 Million Cups – Cedar Valley officially launching this week with HowFactory and AdvanceIowa, and its first Startup Weekend coming next weekend.
• Speaking of - the Iowa Startup Bus will hit the road again, leaving from Cedar Rapids and Iowa City to Startup Weekend Cedar Falls. Snag your free round-trip tickets for Friday here, or for Sunday here, or get both and stay for the weekend. Tickets for Startup Weekend itself are here, plus, it will be part of Global Startup Battle - not to be missed.
• Iowa City- and Chicago-based ClusterFlunk is now an iOS app - check it out on the app store.
• North Liberty-based BlendCard announced a new partnership that will expand the presence of the rewards platform for small businesses in Cedar Rapids and Marion. Read more via The Gazette, CBS2, and the Economic Alliance.
• Kudos to Higher Learning Technologies for their give and take book club, discussed Wednesday at 1 Million Cups. The rapidly-growing Coralville startup has an internal book club, and inspired by a recent selection, the staff will be spreading their used startup books around the community. If you're given one, read it, write a note in the back about what you learned, and pass it on to someone else who could use it. Like a little free library network, just for the startup crowd. Great project!
• Recent Iowa Startup Accelerator grad Re-APP was featured on KCRG.
• Andy Stoll of Seed Here Studio and the Iowa Startup Accelerator reflects on Launch Day in the Des Moines Register: 'A growing tide of support for startups.' Follow Andy on Twitter for more - he's facilitating multiple Startup Weekends in Europe during Global Entrepreneurship Week.
• Grab the Good Life: Check out this new project from entrepreneur and long-time Vault member Josh McNary. It's a blog for and by entrepreneurial families.
• The BELL, or the Bedell Entrepreneurship Learning Laboratory at the University of Iowa, is looking for a new name. UI undergraduate and graduate students are invited to submit ideas. Information here.

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Quotable:

"There's a lot of people who don't believe in me. That sucks. I'll go find those that do."

Todd Smith, co-founder and managing director of Dreamfield Ventures, in his talk, "The Gift of Failure." Read more here.

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Mark your calendar:

• November 16: 3D Printing 101 at the S.T.E.A.M. Room Fab Lab. Information on thesteamroom.org
• November 17, 19, 20: Informational sessions for Venture School. Information on iowajpec.org.
• November 21-23: Startup Weekend Cedar Falls. The first for that community, and part of Global Startup Battle! Information on swcedarfalls.com.
• December 5: Fall Awards Ceremony at the University of Iowa. See the winners from a semester of student business competitions. Information on iowajpec.org.
• December 6-7: Introduction to Python workshop. Information on uipartners.uiowa.edu.
• December 9: Entrepreneurship Demo Day at Coe College. Information on eventbrite.com.
• December 11: Venture School networking event. If you're interested in startup life but don't have a team, come to Share to learn more. Information on twitter.
• December 13-14: Introduction to Ruby on Rails workshop. Information on uipartners.uiowa.edu.
• December 17: Venture School Business Model Canvas competition. See pitches from six cohorts of Venture School. Information on iowajpec.org.
• February 7: Iowa Tech Chicks Summit. The first ever. Information on iowatechchicks.com.
• Send any startup community events I missed to sarah.binder@sourcemedia.net.