The idea is to get an internship in Europe in the middle of college to upskill. In HS I didn't learn as much CS as I could've, unfortunately this puts my programming skills "behind."
My kid refused to try programming 'coz that's what dad does so didn't even start until he was half way though his undergraduate program (math). And he was hired upon graduation by FAANG as a developer.
Do you really think "upskilling" at this stage is better than learning theory? You'll write code for class and can work on some packages with your friends, probably in a more tightly coupled loop than you would in industry.