I’m afraid my thoughts on the matter aren’t that deep or well informed ^^.

In no particular order:

• I grew up in France, and my (probably biased) view, it tends a bit more towards teaching “Literary” subjects, including for engineering students. I think in general this does indeed develop literacy and critical thinking.
• France has “Professors Documentalist” and we call our school libraries “Center for Documentation and Information” from middle school up, with a few (very) introductory courses on using Thesaurus, Bibliography and digital index cards tools (this may of become enshittified by the availability of google since my time there)
• I have a small Lexicography hobby.
• I have a small reading old sources hobby.
• I think more “Traditional” digital search is still incredibly valuable
• I think principles predating the digital age are still incredibly valuable
• The way STEM fields are taught is often focused on “one correct answer”, and i don’t remember that much focus being put on where the sources come from, comparing differing sources, or even any emphasis on how can be certain a given source has been accurately transmitted to the present age in history.
• I think information retrieval is a vital skill (especially with the enshitification of google) that all fields when benefit practitionners from being more comfortable with (though of course it’s still its own job).
• I think software engineers in particular, during their education, would be well served by practical examples of reconciling conflicting or uncertain sources, and I think history is a good lens (less abstract vs software).

I’d be interested in your perspective!