Depends on what kind of profs.Those who teach low level systems stuff absolutely need you to be able to program in C or something similar. On the theoretical side you can kinda sorta get away with very strong math skills. You open CLRS - it just gives you a pseudocode, you do efficiency/correctness analysis on it and forward you go. Then open an Automata book and realize it's all math all the way down. Not a lot of math either.

Kernel programming still resists AI so C and assembly arent going anywhere.