<p>Maybe, as not taking on debt is of paramount concern to you, you should cross reference schools with great Japanese depts & schools that offer significant merit aid.</p>
<p>I found this link for schools offering Japanese:</p>
<p><a href="http://www.colorado.edu/ealld/atj/univ.html%5B/url%5D">http://www.colorado.edu/ealld/atj/univ.html</a></p>
<p>Your stats are excellent; clearly you will have a very good shot at many wonderful schools.</p>
<p>You may also want to see who has great exchanges abroad. </p>
<p>I don't know if it still so, but back in my days at Brown there were fantastic study abroad opportunities in Japan; one of my friends wound up learning Japanese at Brown, doing a program in Tokyo for her junior year, going back after graduation, and then working for Fuji for several years before finally becoming a consultant to firms doing buisness with Japan.</p>
<p>If you reconsider LACs, some of them do give great merit aid too.</p>