Windows 7 upgrade to windows 10 different language issues

Am I just setting up my system incorrectly?

In a way, yes. You certainly aren't reading the tab that you are looking at.

This is is a quick, dirty, incredibly lazy way to guess language settings that's probably right 99% of the time.

Wrong. The installer programs are using the Windows National Language Support API to obtain the system locale and language that you've configured, to determine what language to prompt you in. The locale information is set with the "Formats" tab in that part of Control Panel.

You're using the "Location" tab. Locations are different to locales and languages, not least because the .NET API for them doesn't really function on Windows prior to Windows NT version 6.1. The locations API is a completely different one, that doesn't even exist on Windows XP prior to Service Pack 3. Installer writers who want to have an installer that works on Windows NT prior to version 6.1 will use the locale API, because that's what exists and what works.

It's also what's right.

There's a difference between a geographic ID and a user interface language, and you're getting them exactly backwards. The location or geographic ID of a computer is where it physically is, and that's what you need to set on the "Location" tab in Control Panel. The UI language is the language that you want to see stuff shown to you in, and that's set in a combination of places elsewhere; including the locale settings that are set by the "Formats" tab in Control Panel.

It does say, at the very top of the "Location" tab, what it is for. Why do you think that setting your computer to obtain the "local information such as news and weather" for the United States, because you've told the system that you are physically located in the United States, is the right thing to do when you are physically located in Germany? Locate your machine where it physically is, and set the language and locale to the language and currency/number/date formatting that you want to see on the user interface.

In short: Nearly 100% of the programs from different vendors aren't operating as you think. It's your thinking that's wrong, not the programs.

I was able to come up with a solution to my problem!
There are a few things I learned.

In the "ID", the portion of the number in front of the colon ("1009") represents the Region Keyboard ie English(Canada). The number after the colon ("00001009") is the actual language installed for that keyboard. "00001009" will actually target the "Canada French" under the Region keyboard of English(Canada)

Another thing that I learned is that the region codes on the MS site were not displayed properly, which is why I wasn't able to change the "Locale" properly. This link contains the values you need to use when changing the "Locale". US is GeoID=244

The other thing I ended up having to do was to create two different XML files and run them one after the other. For some reason, removing the English(Canada) keyboard and all of it's sublanguages then adding the English(US) keyboard in the same script was producing an error that was stopping the XML file from applying properly. I had to do the removal of the keyboards (I left the Format and Locale change) in one XML file and the adding of the US keyboard in another XML file.

Anyway, for anyone interested I will post my final XML files below. To run them I used the following commands in a batch file.

control intl.cpl,, /f:"<path_to_file>"

(there is a space after the second comma)

First script to remove keyboards, change Format, and change Locale
Pay special attention to how the "ID" values are done, it illustrates what I was trying to explain above!

    <gs:User UserID="Current"/>

    </gs:UserList>

    <!--input preferences - Keyboard languages-->

    <gs:InputPreferences>

    <!--Beginning of en-CANADA-->

    <!--Remove Canada French from under keyboard English(Canada)-->
    <gs:InputLanguageID Action="remove" ID="1009:00001009"/>
    <!--Remove Canadian MultiLingual Standard from under keyboard English(Canada)-->
    <gs:InputLanguageID Action="remove" ID="1009:00011009"/>
    <!--Remove US from under keyboard English(Canada)-->
    <gs:InputLanguageID Action="remove" ID="1009:00000409"/>

    <!--Beginning of en-US-->
    <!--Add keyboard US(English)-->
    <!--Please note that the command below was moved into another XML file. Reason being, it was causing an error-->
    <!--that would stop the US keyboard from being installed properly.-->
    <!--<gs:InputLanguageID Action="add" ID="0409:00000409" Default="true"/>-->

    </gs:InputPreferences>

    <!--location - Change location on Location tab to US-->

    <gs:LocationPreferences>

    <gs:GeoID Value="244"/>

    </gs:LocationPreferences>

    <!--User Locale - This changes formats to English(United States) ie M/dd/yyyy-->

    <gs:UserLocale>

    <gs:Locale Name="en-US" SetAsCurrent="true"/>

    </gs:UserLocale>


    </gs:GlobalizationServices>

This script will add in the US keyboard and set it as the system default keyboard

   <!--User List-->

   <gs:UserList>

   <gs:User UserID="Current"/>

   </gs:UserList>

   <!--input preferences - Keyboard languages-->

   <gs:InputPreferences>

   <!--Add keyboard US(English)-->
   <gs:InputLanguageID Action="add" ID="0409:00000409" Default="true"/>

   </gs:InputPreferences>

   </gs:GlobalizationServices>

That about sums it up.
Here are some additional helpful links:
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/ms912389%28WinEmbedded.11%29.aspx
http://texhex.blogspot.com/2009/10/installing-and-configuring-language.html
http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/goglobal/bb896001
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc766503(WS.10).aspx