<p>As others have said, since you can study French and Spanish most anywhere, and Arabic is offered at lots of schools too, although not so often as a major, you might want to use other criteria, e.g. size, location, to narrow down your list before focussing in on particular departments. </p>
<p>Once you have a smaller list, you could then consider what it is about languages your son likes and what he plans to do with them. Is he interested in the culture of other countries, or the literature, or is he more interested in the technical side of things, linguistics, translating? Does he plan to use his languages in a business environment, in policy, law, interpreting, to work in something else abroad? Then look for schools that have strengths also in these areas. Where do his other interests lie, e.g. is there a possibility he might ever want to major in, say, engineering, so his schools should have an engineering school/dept.</p>
<p>Dartmouth and Georgetown are known as amongst the best schools for languages, but are no less selective than Middlebury.</p>
<p>Other LACs often mentioned as having good language programs:
Pomona (CA)
Scripps (CA)
Connecticut College (CT)
American U (DC)
Grinnell (IA)
Earlham (IN)
Kalamazoo (MI)
Macalester (MN)
St Olaf (MN)
Colgate (NY)
Vassar (NY)
Kenyon (OH)
Bryn Mawr ¶
Dickinson ¶</p>
<p>State schools:
UCBerkeley (CA)
UCIrvine (CA)
UCLA (CA)
UCSD (CA)
UMich (MI)
UTexas Austin (TX)
UWisconsin Madison (WI)
UVA (VA)
UMass Amherst (MA)
Ohio State (OH)</p>