While I was
slaving working on an essay for a PoliSci class, this beauty dropped into my inbox
*:
Here's the thing that bothered me: "
TAs will not grade/return your paper if it is not also submitted online."
I
have to hand in my essay to
Turnitin? I remember all these posters at the beginning of the year that said that you
didn't have to if you didn't want to (unfortunately, the ones I remember seeing are now gone or plastered over from the recent
elections). Now, my TA won't even mark my essay if I don't submit it?
What is the Turnitin policy?
I emailed
askastudent for help and
Aska told me that there really isn't a policy per se. Basically, profs can use it or not use it. I popped by the
ASSU office with the above email and the rep took one look at it and seethed, "
This is wrong, wrong, wrong." Apparently, they met with the Dean just last week to ensure that students are not forced to use Turnitin if they don't want to.
Well, that's nice. But it's still
hearsay and not official. I wanted to know what the University
officially says about Turnitin. I
Googled a bit and on the
Office of Teaching Support and Innovation website (basically, they support pedagogy at the University) found this:
Here are the important bits:
- The use of Turnitin.com by our instructors is completely voluntary.
- If and when students object to its use on principle, a reasonable offline alternative must be offered.
- Students must be informed at the start of the course that the instructor will be using Turnitin.com (from the FAQ: "This ensures that students can opt out of using the program - something that we allow for here without penalty").
- The course syllabus must include the following statement:
"Normally, students will be required to submit their course essays to Turnitin.com for a review of textual similarity and detection of possible plagiarism. In doing so, students will allow their essays to be included as source documents in the Turnitin.com reference database, where they will be used solely for the purpose of detecting plagiarism. The terms that apply to the University's use of the Turnitin.com service are described on the Turnitin.com web site.”
All right! So Aska and ASSU were right. I was intrigued at the last point, though. What does
my syllabus say?
"Cheating and plagiarism are serious academic offenses. Your assignments will be checked against data bases to ensure that they are your own. We will be using turnitin.com in this course..."
Ah ha. Here it is. Apart from not properly informing my class about using Turnitin, this statement is also one of the
three major reasons why the students who I've talked to hate Turnitin so much - the professor is assuming that I'm guilty before proven innocent, rather than the other way around. It's like being the only suspect of a crime because the police never bothered to even consider that anyone else could have done it, so you're thrown in jail before somebody clears you with an "oops, my bad, that DNA isn't yours after all."
Turnitin does address this issue in its text and calls this a mere "
misconception." They say the use of Turnitin is like having a
referee at a football match. 'Turnitin doesn't imply that you don't trust your students or that you think they're all cheaters. Turnitin is there to make sure everyone is playing by the same rules." But the way
my prof deviates from the established (and neutral) statement doesn't help dispel the "misconception" at all.
The second reason, of course, is the concern over Turnitin's possession of your
intellectual property, even if you retain the copyright to it. Now, Turnitin's documentation claims that their process is legal under Canadian copyright laws and verified by Miller Thomson LLP. Technically, Turnitin maps the words in your essay like a
fingerprint and then compares it to previously mapped fingerprints; thus, not a true representation of your work. With a full legal team behind Turnitin (and they probably have a large legal team, given their controversial nature), I'm not surprised that Turnitin is in full accordance with the law, even if it doesn't feel like it.
Mike Smit, a technology, security and privacy expert, says that he simply doesn't believe Turnitin's claim that it is secure: "Over 200 security breaches have been reported by organizations more reputable than Turnitin since California's breach disclosure law was passed earlier this year. What happens when Turnitin is next? 'We're sorry' won't help."
The third is simple - how effective is Turnitin? Can it accurately detect plagiarism?
There are many stories where Turnitin come up with
false positives or where it's simply been "
easily tricked" by changing a few words around. That is a scary thought, especially if instructors start relying on only Turnitin to determine plagiarism. Even if
CTSI says that "instructors must exercise their independent professional judgment in, and assume responsibility for, determining whether a text has been plagiarized or not," you and I both know how
lazy busy some profs/TAs get. Don't believe me? Let me digress with a note my TA sent:
So what happens if you decide that you (or your prof) don't
want to use Turnitin?
According to CTSI, your prof can:
- require annotated bibliographies from students
- require students submit all rough work with their papers
- require that students include the call numbers or web site addresses of all sources cited in their paper
I don't know the extent of what your prof can or can not ask of you to submit, but there is a
person from the
Office of Teaching Advancement whom you can contact for additional alternative methods.
Our lovely
Fariya tells me that she has a class where her prof asks for documentation instead of using Turnitin. Ironically enough, it's mandatory, and Turnitin is not an alternative. Sounds good, right? But she says that it's so much work that she'd rather just submit it online. Here's what's required:
- Any notes (handwritten or typed) used in the composition of the essay
- Any outline made in preparation for the essay
- Any earlier draft(s) of the essay
- A short (not more than one page) “bibliographic note” which sets forth the sources used and explains why you selected them and how you chose particular portions of each source as evidence for your argument
Doesn't seem too bad and with some planning should be doable, but still, there goes another few hours you could spend doing another essay. If you have three essays due in two days (*ahem*me*ahem*), you definitely don't want to do all that extra work. From reading CTSI, I thought the three possible requirements were either/or. That'd be easy, because I have so many drafts for each essay it's kind of ridiculous.
I know, the irony of writing about anger and then getting extremely angry at the essay.
Anyways, I went back to ASSU and the same rep told me that if I didn't want to use Turnitin, they'll help defend my right not to do so. All I had to do was tell them and they'll go to the department head on my behalf. Nice.
This makes me wonder, though, because like it or not, Turnitin is legit and the opt-out procedure is there. Just how is
Stronger Together going to get it
banned? And do we even want it to?
- Cynthia
* Important information highlighted, identifying information blacked out, names changed to protect the innocent, yada yada.
Here's the thing that bothered me: "TAs will not grade/return your paper if it is not also submitted online."
I have to hand in my essay to Turnitin? I remember all these posters at the beginning of the year that said that you didn't have to if you didn't want to (unfortunately, the ones I remember seeing are now gone or plastered over from the recent elections). Now, my TA won't even mark my essay if I don't submit it? What is the Turnitin policy?
I emailed askastudent for help and Aska told me that there really isn't a policy per se. Basically, profs can use it or not use it. I popped by the ASSU office with the above email and the rep took one look at it and seethed, "This is wrong, wrong, wrong." Apparently, they met with the Dean just last week to ensure that students are not forced to use Turnitin if they don't want to.
Well, that's nice. But it's still hearsay and not official. I wanted to know what the University officially says about Turnitin. I Googled a bit and on the Office of Teaching Support and Innovation website (basically, they support pedagogy at the University) found this:
Here are the important bits:
So what happens if you decide that you (or your prof) don't want to use Turnitin?
According to CTSI, your prof can:
I know, the irony of writing about anger and then getting extremely angry at the essay.
Anyways, I went back to ASSU and the same rep told me that if I didn't want to use Turnitin, they'll help defend my right not to do so. All I had to do was tell them and they'll go to the department head on my behalf. Nice.
This makes me wonder, though, because like it or not, Turnitin is legit and the opt-out procedure is there. Just how is Stronger Together going to get it banned? And do we even want it to?
- Cynthia
* Important information highlighted, identifying information blacked out, names changed to protect the innocent, yada yada.
“argh.jpg”
ARGH!
Wow this is like an encyclopedia entry for Turnitin. Nice work. I feel… empowered! Opting out might just be my choice of action in future… although I am quite curious about how the whole system works and really want to see an “originality report” for one of my papers if a prof would be so kind as to make it accessible (I think they can do that).
Thank you so much for this very informative article. I’ve only used Turnitin once for a class and it definitely wasn’t a pleasant experience. Even though I knew I did the work myself and I put proper citations, I still felt like I was being treated like a criminal right before I clicked the submit button.
Also, this is slightly off topic, but about the prof who has “never heard of a scantron grading error”: the scantron machine itself might not have ever made an error, but there are plenty of other ways that errors can occur. The prof may bubble in the wrong letter on their answer key scantron, the prof may enter in the marks on Blackboard incorrectly, etc. There are numerous incidents of human error, and obviously, these errors cannot be corrected if students are not allowed to check their tests.
If Stronger Together manage to ban Turnitin, it’ll be a lot easier for people to plagiarize!
w.o.w. And the moral of the story is: plan ahead and know the score so you know when you’re gonna have to fight and have the tools to do it.
b.t.w. At another school I had a scantron make several errors. Of course he hasn’t heard of an error; at a school this big, no one checks. omg your lazy teacher.
@Lucy: INORITE. I was pretty pissed when I saw that. At least the prof is awesome, and I like the course. TAs are supposed to be there to help the learning process, not make it difficult.
@Jeff: Thank you! I’m glad you feel empowered! You’ve nailed the reason I wrote this post – I wanted to share all the important bits that I can find and/or research about Turnitin. I’d be interested in seeing an “originality report” too. If any of your profs show you, let me know what it’s like!
As usual, awesome post, Cynthia!
There has been big concerns between not condoning academic plagiarism and expectations on students. I read another interesting blog post on this:
” Pocahontas, Avatar, Sherlock Holmes and Academic Plagiarism”
http://survivingstudenthood.wordpress.com/2010/03/22/pocahontas-avatar-sherlock-holmes-and-academic-plagiarism/
I noticed you mentioned the alternative to Turnitin.com “doesn’t seem to bad”, but for someone like me, it is a lot of unnecessary work. 🙂 See, I work on my essay in phases, rather than drafts. Phase one is to compile the research, Phase two is making an outline, and Phase three is writing the essay. I write the essay in all one go – the only other drafts that occur are for editing (spelling, grammar, etc.) but the pre-essay-writing phases cover all the conceptual ideas rather than the drafts. I don’t do “handwritten notes” or “earlier drafts” as described in the requirements because I find it becomes too confusing when I have multiple drafts. The only drafts I have – which are edits of only one document – are only spelling errors, not conceptual changes indicating I have done my own work.
I find that the requirements do require a lot of extra time – and that hour or two can be spent on another essay. As I have two essays due this Friday which require the above, I have set aside four hours (2 per essay) to ensure I have all the requirements down. Thats a lot of time! And further, I don’t know how much proof is enough, so I might ‘over-proof’, so to speak.
As for Turnitin.com, I don’t find it a better alternative. I have been using it since high school and I don’t like it. I don’t like that they keep my essay. I don’t like that it allows teachers to become complacent in accusing students of plagiarism without bothering to clearly read the turnitin report which doesn’t recognize when you source information. I don’t like that it is mandatory, that I have never, in three years of university, ever been told it is optional. In fact, it is clearly communicated to be the opposite – if you choose not to turn it in to turnitin.com, you can expect to suffer a penalty.
I’m not impressed that U of T does not have their policy straight about turnitin.com. You’re right – a lot of it is heresay, and not official. The ASSU office better be sure that it isn’t mandatory before they proclaim it. And same with our student unions – its a big statement to promise a banning of turnitin on an election platform unless that is a promise you can keep…
Perhaps, this whole comment can be eloquently summed up to echo Lucy’s comment above:
“Arg!”
Cheers 🙂
Fariya
@Susan: Thanks for that list of ways where Turnitin can go wrong! I’ll remember is for a rebuttal next time a TA pulls something like that.
@Tara: Really? You think so? Why’s that? I thought it’d be harder to plagiarize when you actually have to provide previous drafts and documentations and the like.
@Fariya: U of T does have the policy straight. It’s written so on the website. It’s just that a lot of profs don’t know it, or choose to ignore it ;p
I think that this website is a BIG joke. When I started college, I had to write a paper about a personal experience. I chose Breast Cancer. I wrote about my experience totally from the heart. No books. When it was turned in to turnitin, it said that it was 85% plagarized. How can that be? I didn’t use any quotes from books, just my own experience. The professor gave me a 0 on my paper. I was thoroughly pissed because I didn’t get any of my information from books. I have no trust in this website at all.
Really enjoyed your article! Thanks for the information.
Really enjoyed your article (four years later)! Thanks for posting.