Regarding using the word 'student' in language strings, from http://docs.moodle.org/dev/Help_strings:
The following words should be used in the en help strings whenever it is necessary to refer to people with particular roles in a generic sense.
- Participants - all people with a role
- Teachers - people with some sort of a facilitation/editing role
- Students - people primarily there to learn
- Users - people across the site