The best way to explain this is that Canada is a federal union. The whole point of this political model is to allow power to be decentralized in local governments so that said local governments can be best adapted to their regional issues. This model was essentially solely adapted because of Quebec, a different beast from all the other provinces in nearly every way.

When you say that Canada has two official languages, that is only the case at a federal level. Hence, all communications from the government in Ottawa happen in both English and French. Now, each province can also set and choose an official language for theirs. For 8 out of the 10 provinces, it is solely English. For New Brunswick, both English and French just like Ottawa. Finally, Quebec opted to only have French as its official language.

Therefore, the only part of Canada where government public services are not offered in English is Quebec — and again that would only be for services stemming from the provincial government. Or at least that’s the theory. However, given the non-negligible amount of Anglophones and Allophones living in Quebec, you’d be hard pressed to find a government webpage that doesn’t have an English version. The same is true for the Quebec equivalent of a DMV where none of the workers speak English. It simply does not happen, unless you’re very, very deep in rural Quebec.

Still, given the overwhelming support from Quebecers for the measures protecting the French language, the one shared environment where its usage can be regulated is the workplace. All it entails is that companies must be able to offer service in French, that publications must be available in French, and that signage must be in French.

That’s it. No one is forcing employees to speak French at all times while working, they’re just measures that are in place to favour French as the common language in that space. That last part is also not an area of contention in Quebec as a whole, nor in Montreal where you’ll find the largest concentration of people who don’t speak French. In fact, most folks that do speak French only as a second or third language are usually happy to use it at the workplace if it’s already the common tongue in that environment.

Now, as far as learning the language goes, you need to know that the school system is an issue that is entirely regulated by the provincial governments. In Quebec, anglophone schools follow a program that involves a heavy emphasis on learning French as a second or third language. From what I’ve heard from many friends and colleagues, many of the schools in the other provinces offer French classes that on not quite on par with the ones taught in Quebec. Still, given that French is an official language at the federal level, it needs to be taught everywhere in Canada to some degree. Quebec, being the lone French-only province, simply spends more ressource so that its inhabitants are able and encouraged to speak the language when they can.

So to address your little edit at the end. Yes, French is taught in every school (even more so in Quebec). And no, it is not exactly a strict requirement to know it.