student
Americannoun
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a person formally engaged in learning, especially one enrolled in a school or college; pupil.
a student at Yale.
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any person who studies, investigates, or examines thoughtfully.
a student of human nature.
noun
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a person following a course of study, as in a school, college, university, etc
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( as modifier )
student teacher
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a person who makes a thorough study of a subject
Pronunciation
See new.
Usage
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 deeperWe 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.
Synonym Usage
See pupil 1.
Other Word Forms
Derived Forms
Inflected Forms
Nouns
Etymology
Origin of student
First recorded in 1350–1400; Middle English, from Latin student- (stem of studēns ), present participle of studēre “to take pains”; see -ent; replacing Middle English studiant, aphetic variant of estudiant, from Old French, noun use of present participle of estudier “to devote oneself to, study” ( see study
Compare meaning
How does student compare to similar and commonly confused words? Explore the most common comparisons:
Explanation
If you teach your best friend how to play "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star" on the harmonica, then you can call her your student. A student is someone who's learning to do something or who attends a school. At school, there are students and teachers: the job of the teachers is to instruct the students in various subjects and the students' job is to learn. If you start school as a kindergartner and attend college and graduate school, it's possible that you may be a student for more than 20 years! Even after you finish school, you may still be a student, if you take swimming classes or learn to speak German in your spare time.
Vocabulary lists containing student
Example Sentences
Examples are provided to illustrate real-world usage of words in context. Any opinions expressed do not reflect the views of Dictionary.com.
See Examples For:
As a college student in the late 1950s he’d been inspired to become a psychiatrist after reading Sigmund Freud’s work.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 28, 2026
Powell described it as a "real cost-of-living issue" for young people, adding: "They're paying high repayments and never, ever paying off the capital of their student loan."
From BBC ● Jul. 28, 2026
I first met the Westerinen family in 1999 as a graduate student in New York City, writing my thesis on the rise of genetic genealogy.
From Salon ● Jul. 27, 2026
In the eastern state of Bihar, a police official was suspended for using an assault rifle to disperse student protesters in Siwan district on Saturday.
From Barron's ● Jul. 27, 2026
I was the only student in school who owned a dog team, but in the town there were dozens, and most of them raced on Saturdays.
From "Black Star, Bright Dawn" by Scott O'Dell
One of his students, John Stewart, shared his interest in folk, and they started a trio, with John Montgomery, called the Cumberland Three.
From The Wall Street Journal ● Jul. 28, 2026
In November last year, then-Chancellor Rachel Reeves said the repayment threshold for students with Plan 2 loans would be frozen at £29,385 between 2027 and 2030, instead of rising with inflation.
From BBC ● Jul. 28, 2026
There were a lot of tears at my school on June 10, the last day of school, not just from students but from many teachers as well.
From Salon ● Jul. 28, 2026
It took the 2023 deaths of four Pepperdine students to force safety improvements along California’s cinematic stretch of highway.
From Los Angeles Times ● Jul. 28, 2026
There had to be more than a hundred students leaving the building right now.
From "Bye Forever, I Guess" by Jodi Meadows
Definitions and idiom definitions from Dictionary.com Unabridged, based on the Random House Unabridged Dictionary, © Random House, Inc. 2023
Idioms from The American Heritage® Idioms Dictionary copyright © 2002, 2001, 1995 by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company. Published by Houghton Mifflin Harcourt Publishing Company.
