What is TurnItIn.com?
Who is Eligible to Use Turnitin?
Are Student Papers Kept Confidential?
What are the consequences of plagiarism for UAH students?
As a faculty member, what should I do if I believe a student has plagiarized?
As a student, where can I learn more about plagiarism?
As a student, what should I do if I have been accused of plagiarism?
What are the advantages of Turnitin?
As a faculty member, how do I sign up for a Turnitin account?
If I am a student, how do I sign up for a Turnitin account?
How long does it take for Turnitin to check an uploaded paper?
How are papers uploaded to Turnitin?
Is a paper that receives a high similarity rating necessarily plagiarized?
How do you keep from having too many matches for papers on general or common topics?
I forgot the enrollment password I created for my class. Is there a way I can look that up?
What is Turnitin.com?
TurnItIn.com is a Web-based plagiarism detection service available to UAH faculty and staff worldwide who are currently teaching or support teaching activities at UAH.
TurnItIn.com has a database of over a million papers submitted to them, a digitized version of the Gutenberg Collection of Literary Classics, and papers pulled from the Internet and various "paper mills," (i.e., services that sell term papers).
The parent organization of TurnItIn.com is Plagiarism.org. You may want to look over their Research Resources for tips on how to prevent plagiarism in the first place.
Who is Eligible to Use TurnItIn.com?
All UAH faculty and staff currently teaching or supporting teaching activities.
Are Student Papers Kept Confidential?
Yes. The UAH license with Turnitin.com specifies a privacy pledge in accordance with FERPA, the Family Educational Rights and Privacy Act. The U.S. Department of Education's FERPA Regulations give the requirements on the confidentiality of student records and information. If you are concerned about student privacy, it is always a good idea to use aliases for actual student names when submitting papers for review by Turnitin.com. We recommend you use aliases to ensure that student privacy is protected.
What is plagiarism?
According to the UAH Code of Student Conduct in the UAH Student Handbook, plagiarism can be defined as “the use of any other person’s work (such work need not be copyrighted) and the unacknowledged incorporation of that work in one’s own work offered in fulfillment of academic requirements.” In other words, plagiarism is the use of another’s original words or ideas as if they were your own.
What are the consequences of plagiarism for UAH students?
Plagiarism is an act of academic dishonesty, which threatens the academic integrity of UAH. If a faculty member suspects a student of plagiarism, he or she can choose to deal with the student within the context of the course, by requiring a revision, giving the student a failing grade, or several other disciplinary options. The faculty member can choose to file a complaint with the University Judicial Officer, which can result in a hearing by the University Judicial Board (UJB). If the student is found guilty of plagiarism, the UJB can choose from a variety of sanctions, including issuing a warning, a censure, educational alternatives, disciplinary probation, disciplinary suspension, and expulsion.
As a faculty member, what should I do if I believe a student has plagiarized?
Faculty members do have options when they think a student has plagiarized. The faculty member can choose to deal with a student within the confines of the course by holding a conference with the student in which the faculty member presents the evidence of plagiarism and the student has the chance to explain or rebut the accusation. The faculty member can also choose to file a complaint with the University Judicial Officer, which can result in a resolution through mediation or a hearing from the University Judicial Board.
As a student, where can I learn more about plagiarism?
If a student has any questions about plagiarism or citing sources, he or she should not hesitate to talk to a faculty member, the library staff, or visit the UAH Writing Center. In addition, this web site contains valuable sections describing plagiarism and citations, such as Avoiding Plagiarism and Proper Citation of Sources.
As a student, what should I do if I have been accused of plagiarism?
Whether you are guilty or innocent, you should be aware of your rights and responsibilities as a student and the judicial process. It would be valuable for you to read the Code of Student Conduct, which is included in the UAH Student Handbook. Also, you can refer to the section of this web site titled Rights and Responsibilities.
If I submit a paper for one class and then submit the same paper again for another class, is this plagiarism?
This is not plagiarism, but it is recycling work, which is a lower academic standard. This does not mean that you will never use the same ideas in subsequent courses, but you should put forth the effort to produce novel work for each of your classes. Each course is unique in its learning objectives and method of instruction, and it is not likely that one paper will fulfill the expectations of both faculty members. In addition, even though you are not violating UAH’s Code of Student Conduct, you may be violating the standards set by a college, department, or faculty member.
How does Turnitin work?
Turnitin allows the student or educator to upload a paper into the Turnitin database, and the software will then use algorithms to create “digital fingerprints” that can identify similar patterns in text. Then the paper is matched to billions of web pages, paper mill essays, and student papers submitted online. Finally, in an hour or less, Turnitin creates an “originality report” that records any passages from the paper that might not be authentic, and lists web sites and other resources that include previously submitted papers that have matched content to the passages.
What are the advantages of Turnitin?
Turnitin was the first of its kind of plagiarism prevention system and is recognized worldwide as a valuable resource for educators and students. Faculty can use Turnitin to make the process of detecting plagiarism easier and more efficient. Students can use Turnitin to check their own papers to see if they have properly cited sources. In addition, Turnitin provides students and faculty with a variety of educational resources on preventing and avoiding plagiarism, writing research papers, and citing sources.
As a faculty member, how do I sign up for a Turnitin account?
Contact the UAH Turnitin administrator, Jack Drost to create an account for you.
If I am a student, how do I sign up for a Turnitin account?
Your instructor must give you a class ID number and a class enrollment password. Then, you visit www.turnitin.com to create a user profile and use the class ID and enrollment password to enroll.
How long does it take for Turnitin to check an uploaded paper?
Turnitin will check a paper against the web and generate an originality report in an hour or less.
How are papers uploaded to Turnitin?
To upload a paper into Turnitin, students or faculty log into their Turnitin accounts and find the appropriate classes. Then, they can either: a) copy and paste their paper into a text box and click submit or b) browse for a file and click submit. Faculty and students can submit their papers in Microsoft Word, plain text, RTF, PDF, or Postscript formats.
Is a paper that receives a high similarity rating necessarily plagiarized?
No. A high similarity rating does not mean that a student has plagiarized; it only indicates that the faculty member should review the paper for possible plagiarism. There are several reasons besides plagiarism that a paper would receive a high similarity rating. For instance, if a student includes many properly cited references in one paper, it might show a high similarity rating. In addition, if the student has previously submitted the paper to Turnitin prior to the final submission, it might show a high similarity rating.
Does Turnitin check against newspaper articles and books to ensure that students have not cut and pasted from them?
Yes. Most of the world’s newspapers are available on the Internet, making it easy for Turnitin to check papers against these sources. However, not all books are available on the Internet, but Turnitin is able to check papers against those books that reside on the Internet.
How do you keep from having too many matches for papers on general or common topics?
Turnitin’s database uses a very careful source analysis, which eliminates as many irrelevant matches as possible, while still noting suspect matching passages.
I forgot the enrollment password I created for my class. Is there a way I can look that up?
After you log in to Turnitin, you should see a box with a line for each of your classes. At the far right of the line for each class is a green button under the heading "update." If you click on the green button you will see the class name and enrollment password. You can change the password here as well if you wish.
