student

[ stood-nt, styood- ]

noun

1. a person formally engaged in learning, especially one enrolled in a school or college; pupil:

   a student at Yale.

2. any person who studies, investigates, or examines thoughtfully:

   a student of human nature.

student

/ ˈstjuːdənt /

noun

1. 1. a person following a course of study, as in a school, college, university, etc
   2. ( as modifier )

      student teacher

2. a person who makes a thorough study of a subject

Pronunciation Note

See new.

Other Words From

• student·less adjective
• student·like adjective
• anti·student noun adjective
• non·student noun

Word History and Origins

Origin of student¹

First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English, from Latin student- (stem of studēns ), present participle of studēre “to take pains”; -ent; replacing Middle English studiant, aphetic variant of estudiant, from Old French, noun use of present participle of estudier “to devote oneself to, study” ( study

Word History and Origins

Origin of student¹

C15: from Latin studēns diligent, from studēre to be zealous; see study

Synonym Study

See pupil ¹.

Example Sentences

The university’s announcement comes as the school celebrates its bicentennial and days after students marched to LeBlanc’s on-campus residence and demanded the closure of the Regulatory Studies Center, the GW Hatchet reported.

From Washington Post

Schools that have high numbers of students of color suffer chronic underfunding and less support across the country.

From Washington Post

School systems are reporting alarming numbers of students falling behind.

From Washington Post

The deal sets the stage for prekindergarten and special-education students to return to school buildings on Thursday.

From Washington Post

His family repeatedly sought records from the small local police department on Maryland’s Eastern Shore, desperate to understand the final minutes the 19-year-old college student spent alive.

From Washington Post

According to the USDA, student participation began to fall, with 1.4 million students opting out of the lunch program entirely.

From The Daily Beast

Abraham, a yellow cab driver and student, feels that blacks are targeted unfairly by the police.

From The Daily Beast

This was also the year Duke University student Belle Knox put college girls on the map.

From The Daily Beast

HONG KONG—Last year, I met a Chinese graduate student on a tour of the northeastern United States before his first day at Harvard.

From The Daily Beast

The congressman traces his belief in Santa Claus back 40 years, when he was a student going to college “on the GI Bill.”

From The Daily Beast

It was one day when a student from the Stuttgardt conservatory attempted to play the Sonata Appassionata.

From Project Gutenberg

The student who does not intend to arouse himself need hope for no keen sense of beauty.

From Project Gutenberg

A pupil of her father until his death, when she became a student under Gabriel Max, in Munich, for a year.

From Project Gutenberg

One of them had taken four years of theology, and is an excellent student, and not so fitting for other things.

From Project Gutenberg

A story or narrative is invented for the purpose of helping the student, as it is claimed, to memorise it.

From Project Gutenberg

Related Words

• graduate
• junior
• pupil
• scholar
• undergraduate

More About Student

Where does student come from?

The word student entered English around 1350–1400. It ultimately derives from the Latin studēre. The meaning of this verb is one we think will resonate with a lot of actual students out there: “to take pains.” No, we’re not making this up: a student, etymologically speaking, can be understood a “pains-taker”!

In Latin, studēre had many other senses, though, and ones that some students may have a harder time relating to. Studēre could also mean “to desire, be eager for, be enthusiastic about, busy oneself with, apply oneself to, be diligent, pursue, study.” The underlying idea of student, then, is about striving—for new knowledge and abilities. It’s about that mix of hard work and passion. Isn’t that inspirational?

Dig deeper

We don’t think you have to be a student of etymology to make the connection between student and study. Like student, the verb study also comes from the Latin studēre. The noun study—as in The scientists conducted a sleep study or Her favorite room of her house is the study—is also related to studēre and is more immediately derived from the Latin noun studium, meaning “zeal, inclination,” among other senses.

 

But not all connections between words are so obvious. Consider student and tweezers. Would you have guessed this unlikely pair of words share a common root? Let’s, um, pick this apart.

Tweezers are small pincers or nippers for plucking our hairs, extracting splinters, picking up small objects, and so forth. The word entered English in the mid-1600s, based on tweeze, an obsolete noun meaning “case of surgical instruments,” which contained what we now call tweezers.

Losing its initial E along the way, tweeze comes from etweese, which is an English rendering of the French etui, a type of small case used to hold needles, cosmetic instruments, and the like. Etui can ultimately be traced back to the Latin stūdiāre, “to treat with care,” related to the same studēre. This is how student is related to, of all things, tweezers.

Did you know ... ?

For further study, explore the following words that share a root with student: 

• étude
• studio
• studious