BYPASSING TURNITIN PLAGIARISM CHECKER – MORAL AND ETHICAL IMPLICATIONS

 BYPASSING TURNITIN PLAGIARISM CHECKER – MORAL AND ETHICAL IMPLICATIONS

Turnitin is an anti-plagiarism program that compares student papers to a massive online database of previously submitted papers, scholarly articles, and other online resources to identify instances of similar text. It is a “text-matching” program to teach students proper referencing and citation practices.

As a reminder, Turnitin does not detect plagiarism. Unlike other plagiarism detection tools, Turnitin will only compare the text from a student’s assignment to content found online (e.g., found on the Internet, within journals, or on databases of student papers). The success of Turnitin relies on instructors and students correctly interpreting these results.

Turnitin is a service that helps you avoid plagiarism by detecting when you’ve made factual errors in your citations or paraphrased material without giving proper credit. To determine whether or not your submitted paper is original, Turnitin checks it against a massive database of previously submitted papers, websites, books, articles, and more.

Many classes at AMU and APU use Turnitin, which is built into the Assignments platform. You won’t need to create a separate account at Turnitin.com; instead, your paper will be submitted through the service automatically after you upload it to your classroom for grading.

Because it generates a Similarity Report, it can be used to spot instances of possible plagiarism. Turnitin’s services can be accessed via a button within Cornell’s Canvas LMS, and you may only use Turnitin in the classroom.

Most of the Group of Eight universities and many other top schools worldwide use Turnitin to improve their teaching and the quality of their students’ education. Turnitin is used at the ANU for two reasons: to ensure that student work is original and to teach students how to properly cite and reference sources.

Turnitin also improves how students receive their grades and feedback on assessment items by providing instructors with cutting-edge online grading tools. Turnitin is not meant as a punishment or a way to ‘catch students out,’ and students must know this.

Turnitin’s primary function is to facilitate online grading for faculty while also giving students a dynamic tool for learning and applying proper citation and reference format in their writing, If unethical behavior is suspected as a result of Turnitin use, the information obtained from the service cannot be used to draw definitive conclusions, this data would be evaluated in light of the ANU Code of Practice for Student Academic Integrity.

If a professor wants to use Turnitin with a specific class or assignment, they can make what Wattle calls a “Turnitin Assignment.” A ‘Turnitin Assignment’ submitted from within Wattle will be sent to Turnitin for matching; also, Turnitin keeps a copy of all submitted assignments, but it does not share or reproduce them in any way. Even though a backup copy of an assignment may be kept, it is never shared with anyone but the student who originally completed it.

Now that you have gotten a good understanding of what Turnitin is and how it works, we will move on to answer the question of Turnitin’s originality report. Turnitin generates a report called the “Originality Report” after it compares a student’s submission to content on the web.

The “Originality Report” shows instances of “text matching” between a student’s submission and external sources. The Similarity Index shows the total percentage of the submission that was matched against other sources, and the Originality Report shows in detail what text within the submission was matched against what source (e.g. internet sites, journals, or previous submissions).

The key point to remember about Turnitin is that it does not find instances of plagiarism for you; rather, it generates a report that teachers and students can use to identify potential instances of plagiarism. It is highly unlikely that a student would be accused of plagiarism without a thorough review of the report by a member of staff to ensure there are reasonable academic grounds for the accusation.

Any work uploaded to Turnitin is kept in the database and compared to other submissions from students at other universities. All submissions you make will remain your property. To make sure that your work is used fairly and legally, Turnitin’s developers collaborate closely with the UK Information Commissioner’s Office.

Turnitin has an enormous and constantly expanding database. Turnitin has partnerships with numerous publishing houses to incorporate newly published books, journals, and conferences into its database. There is also an ongoing effort to add many previously published works that have fallen out of print. Unfortunately, Turnitin’s database is not exhaustive, so it may fail to detect all instances of plagiarism.

A high originality index is not always indicative of plagiarism, and a low originality index is not always indicative of original work. It is highly probable – and perhaps even desirable – that some matches will occur in university academics because in many subjects, learning the ‘language of the discipline’ is part of the academic process. The depth to which this is required depends on the complexity of the topic, the number of quotations you use, and your chosen academic tone.

Do not try to achieve some arbitrary originality score that you hope will be low enough to sneak by detection systems. Even if only a small amount of text is copied, accusations of plagiarism can arise. Instead, strive for scholarly-level writing in which you properly cite all of your sources.

Turnitin is just one of many programs that can help you avoid plagiarising accidentally. Keep in mind that your work will also be read by subject experts who have extensive experience marking student work. In cases where plagiarism detection software like Turnitin fails, they can identify the source of the copied material, as a deterrent against dishonesty in the academic world.

Some Important Benefits of Turnitin are;

• It helps students to generate reports that can be used to spot instances of plagiarism.
• It equips students with a means of detecting and fixing instances of plagiarism in their writing so that they can improve their academic writing overall.

Conclusion 

Now that you know the moral and ethical implications of bypassing the Turnitin checker, it is also important to note that the Turnitin checker not only helps you maintain originality but also improves your overall writing skills and creativity.

If you have any concerns or questions, feel free to drop them in the comment section. We’ll be glad to have them.