I concur with Lisa that this is something the people need to learn (that is why they're taking a class).  

FWIW, I've seen people copy square brackets for optional arguments, "mypow(base[, exp])" and angle brackets for syntax, "<pos_result> if <cond> else <neg_result>".  We also see it with the ellipsis.

Accordingly, there should be a FAQ entry or tutorial section on meta-syntactic variable and syntax placeholders.   The would also be a good place to cover the confusing "/" and "*" notations generated by the argument clinic:  __getattribute__(self, name, /).

FWIW, if your students are also cutting-and-pasting the prompt, this is clearly an education issue and not an issue with the venv docs.