If you missed something important, everything else could be built on that and you won't understand any of it. Yea, it's a bad joke, but a light one. No one has said anything else to my face. It's not a concern for me currently. All of the advisory groups at the center stem from the Equal Opportunity office.
All minority groups are well represented.
My involvement right now is to the extent of making Ames Research Center a better place to work through understanding diversity. My recollection is that most teachers just wanted to finish the curriculum that was assigned to them. I have mixed feelings about what a teacher should or shouldn't encourage because it might not be right for that student and they could feel pressured to do something they aren't comfortable with. I remember being extremely frustrated by that. Teachers really need to emphasize on the WHY a lot more and less on grades.