I think there are a lot of people here who want to equate taking advanced math with rushing and pushing. There are two issues here. First, there are kids for whom this is not rushing or pushing, it’s appropriate placement. It’s not that they need to complete several college math classes before they finish high school. It’s that they are ready to do so and they want to do so.
The second issue is the subject of this thread. In a better or more competitive school district, you could have 50 or 100 graduating seniors taking calculus. If the kid or their parents wants to attend a top school, especially as a STEM major, and they don’t have calculus, that doesn’t look good in the context of their school and their opportunities. This isn’t about whether you need calculus. It’s not about whether some other kid got in without calculus. It’s not about whether the college offers calculus. It’s merely about what the colleges themselves are saying, that they want to see kids challenging themselves with what is available to them and that they are judged in that context. Commentators who want to pull that out of context and insist that no school requires calculus or that some kids get in without it or that even the engineering sequence starts with calculus are missing the point. It’s about whether the school is likely to judge that kid as being among the most competitive applicants. And maybe they still will, because the kid may have challenged themselves in other ways or had some major accomplishments.