As a little update to this thread, I have thought things over and pretty much decided on the following for my CG course (starting in january):

Instead of offering the labs in C only, I will give them a choice: C or FPC. To me that's a no-brainer choice, but I will just let them decide, and recommend FPC for those who have little experience in working with pointers or who just prefer a language with fewer traps. And if they prefer C, be my guest.

The course is about CG and OpenGL, not about messing with pointers and learning C, and quite a few students don't have sufficient C skills anyway. Maybe I can help a few people and make the course a little bit more fun for me at the same time.