Comment on Anon visits Canada
gramie@lemmy.ca 1 month agoI went to university in Canada for engineering in the early 1980s. We had to learn both Imperial and metric, because almost all the textbooks and equipment came from the US. We would usually convert into metric to do all calculations and then convert back at the end because to do otherwise is insanity.
I would guess that the same is still true today, because the equipment and textbooks still come from the US.
adespoton@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
Not so much today; as I mentioned, the transition period was from 1970 to 1985. While some textbooks and equipment still comes from the US, a lot is also sourced from other parts of the world, and some textbooks are Canadian versions now (in metric).
In fact, the textbook countries spent a good 20 years from the late 80s to the early 00s churning out new editions on an annual basis where a bit more was converted to metric every time. This often forced students to buy up to three editions of a book new if a department was using the same text for a course series.
gramie@lemmy.ca 1 month ago
I could actually see the point in learning both, because there is a very good chance that engineers are going to be facing both systems in their professional lives.