wrote:

We have a senior boy and freshman girl. Our girl must get to school
early (a whole 20 min) to drop off her instrument before her first
class. School starts at 7:40 am and we like to leave at 7:15 - 7:20
am.

Why are you driving either of them to school? Is there no
transportation?

We have had to leave without him four times to get our daughter to
school on time. He refuses to go into his first hour class late and
misses first hour.

My kid's HS had the rule that a tardy was the same as an unexcused
absence, and 5 unexcused absences meant an automatic F. Since my
girls didn't want to miss school, and would do just about anything
needed to be there on time, after the first time dd#1 was tardy, I
told her that if she were later than to homeroom (the first 10 minutes
- and tardy to homeroom had no consequences) just not to go to school
at all, and I would write an excuse slip. I never had to do it
because except for a nightmare of car trouble that first day, she was
never late again.

[She drove one car and it died in town. So she walked back home
(about a mile), asking the gas station that was on the way to pick the
car up and take it home for her. She got into the truck, but she
thought there was some problem with it and she only went about 1/4
mile before she turned around and brought it back to the house. By
the time she started out in the third vehicle, she was about 15
minutes late and it was counted as an unexcused tardy because they
said she could have taken the bus and gotten there on time. The
reason she was driving was so that she could get home after band
practice.]

Very frustrating that he cannot get up to leave on
time - he gets up at 7:45 and takes long shower.

He's getting up five minutes after school starts. So the first
problem is when he gets up. Why does he not get up earlier?

What is his first period class? Why does he want to miss it?

We excused a few of
these absences. The school does nothing accept lower his grade. He
has lost what few privileges he has at home. His response is that we
should buy him a car so that he can drive separately. We live in an
affluent are where most kids have cars.

What does he say he would do if you bought him a car?

Should we pick our battles and excuse these and drive him separately?

We are worried that he will never succeed of anything.

He's succeeding at what he wants to do now which is driving you crazy
and putting the pressure on him to get him a car.

My response would be one of two things depending on whether you could
get him a car or not.

1) If you could get him a car, then I would say to him - if you want a
car, you will have to get up on time to get to school with us for a
whole semester (4 months). If you can do that, you have demonstrated
that you should have a car. However if you slip and we have to drive
you in separately, the time starts over again.

2) If you can't or don't want him to have a car, then I would say -
tough. If you don't go with us, then you will have to walk (or
whatever the alternate is) and we will not write an excuse anymore.

Keeping in mind that as people have said -failing grades in the senior
year will cause some colleges to reject him on that basis alone. My
niece had a spot at the University of PA, but she slacked off in her
senior year and got a C in calculus and so they rescinded the offer.