Plagiarism Detection Software
Reno Giovannetti Instructional technologist College of the Redwoods Jan 2017
Originality checking can encourages best practices for using and citing other people's written material. Instructors
have various reasons for using originality checking software and have developed a number of techniques for
applying it to their evaluation of student work. The broader question of whether to use originality checking
software and for what purposes is beyond the scope of this document.
Turnitin:
Turnitin is the leading originality checking and plagiarism prevention service used by institutions worldwide.
Institutions license Turnitin on an annual basis using FTES as the contract index. Individual accounts are no longer
supported. An instructor can use the service with or without Canvas integration to submit electronic papers to
Turnitin’s proprietary software that then compares the paper’s text to a database of millions of pages of digital
content (including archived internet content that is no longer available on the live web) and millions of papers in
the student paper archive, and professional, academic and commercial journals and publications.
Since 2014 when we started using the canvas integration about 55 instructors have attempted to use Turnitin with
Canvas. I would estimate that about 65 instructors are currently using Turnitin ether standalone or with the
integration.
We have usage data for Turnitin going back to 2005. The English department setup a separate account “Center for
Teaching Excellence” this account has been used as a standalone account with no integration to any LMS and has
approximately 52,000 student submissions since being setup in 2005 (that is about 50% of our overall
submissions). Usage of this account has steady been declining since 2011 probably due to declining enrolment and
the use of the Canvas integration account. There are currently about 20 active users in this standalone account.
Before the end of 2015 the Turnitin integration with Canvas was simple (a single check box in the assignment
setup) and the results of the report were available to students and instructors. No other functionality or access to
Turnitin tools was provided. At the end of 2015 Turnitin required a change to the integration making it much more
complicated to use and maintain. These changes have had a dramatic effect on the use of the Turnitin (see below).
The complications with the interface have reduced the simplicity and reliability of the integration to a point were
some instructors are no longer willing to use it. Instructors who are familiar with Turnitin and have used it as a
standalone tool are having fewer problems with the use of the integration. Students seem to have fewer problems
using the standalone version of Turnitin.
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