a 3.7 UW is nothing to be ashamed of… perfection is an elusive goal. I’d let him go on that front.
If he’s still not interested, come next November, I would coerce him into applying to a 3-5 of CSUs and walk through the ap with him. You can couch it as keeping doors open. His ‘local’ school and few others that you have toured . UCs and privates are more time consuming aps (essays and such) so, that may be too big of a thing to force. If he gets into Chico, Sonoma, Sac and SDSU and decides the local CC is the best choice - that’s an OK outcome… In my expeience, few of his classmates will wind up where they think they will and he’ll want the go away option open to him come April… If he doesn’t submit the aps, it will be too late. The lead time on the whole process is really hard for many teenage minds to handle.
Neither of my kids were interested in college until the last minute. If i hadn’t pushed them, they wouldn’t have applied anywhere on their own. One is a fairly recent Chico grad and the other is a happy sophomore at a WUE school out of state. Their friends who defaulted to a CC have been kinda stuck and found it tough to get motivated. Their friends that applied to directly to several 4 year schools but decided to go to a CC then transfer found an easier path, they were better prepared with pre-reqs, etc. Small sample size … but, in my experience, having options is better than not…
good luck.