Why metacentric height is taught two ways

History students need a rule-of-thumb account of metacentric height that explains why ships roll and why loading matters. Engineering students need the equations because a bad calculation can put people in danger. Each group uses the concept differently, so the lesson changes with the work its students are preparing to do. The related engineering course combined ethics, disasters, and academic skills. That framing treated safe design as a professional responsibility. The later stability diagram therefore stays conceptual instead of becoming a mathematical derivation.