<p>As another poster discussed, a visit to the campus is certainly in order. My son spent several days at each of the two schools he was considering that were far away and that we knew little about. One went off his list after he could see how the fraternity system worked personally. He had gotten mixed stories about it, but really most kids did not feel it was a big deal. It was a enough of an issue for him that he did not want to go to that school. The other school was one where he loved the atmosphere more every minute he was there, and that became his first choice school. </p>
<p>The schools that were closer to us were more known to us in terms of atmosphere and we knew that there were not very many degrees of separation among many of the kids there and my son. But for the far away schools, that was not the case at all, so we did check them out much more carefully in terms of fit and feeling.</p>
<p>I can tell you in the last 20 years, any number of schools have had terrible incidents of intolerance, racism, homophobia , and some of those schools have been quite diverse with sizable minority populations and the incidents were not at all reflective of the schools. Just like some horrific crime can occur on a generally safe campus, such incidents can crop up at schools where this is not at all the norm.</p>