If you’re going in to a science, you’re going to need to take it at some point. It’s a fundamental part of the mathematical language and a hugely important tool in the sciences and in especially in engineering. It’s good to get it out of the way in high school so it isn’t constricting what you can take in college. Most colleges accept the AP Calc test for at least placement, which is not true for a lot of the other APs. I won’t pretend to know a ton about engineering, but my impression is that most people in engineering programs come in with at least some calculus (@bodangles would know more about this).