Plagiarism and Turnitin What is plagiarism? Why is it a bad thing? Background to Turnitin and UEA pilots Turnitin Demonstration

What is plagiarism? Plagiarism is the unacknowledged use of another persons work. Collusion is a form of plagiarism, involving unauthorised co-operation between at least two people, with the intent to deceive.

Art is either plagiarism or revolution. Paul Gauguin ( ) Mona Lisa Leonardo da Vinci (~1504) L.H.O.O.Q. Marcel Duchamp (1919)

The Watchtower and a Rising Sun All Along the Watchtower Compare Bob Dylan (John Wesley Harding 1967) with Jimi Hendrix (Electric Ladyland 1968) – and then listen to Bob Dylan on Before the Flood (1974) House of the Rising Sun Compare Bob Dylan (Bob Dylan 1962 ) with Eric Burdon and the Animals (1964) – and Dave Van Ronk (?) (Dylan, 2004, Chronicles 1, p 262)

Historians lose Da Vinci Code plagiarism appeal Dan Brown, the American author, did not copy large parts of an earlier book to produce his blockbuster novel, The Da Vinci Code, the Court of Appeal ruled today. March 28, McEwan hits back at call for atonement Ian McEwan, one of the most revered authors of his generation, has hit back at accusations that he copied another writers work the second time the novelist has had to face such claims. November 27, Recent high-profile allegations

" Iraq - Its Infrastructure Of Concealment, Deception And Intimidation" (2003) aka The Dodgy Dossier (Channel 4 News) (accessed July 4 th 2007) Glen Rangwala (Cambridge) - the bulk of the 19-page document (pp.6-16) is directly copied without acknowledgement from an article in last September's Middle East Review of International Affairs - It's quite striking that even Marashi's typographical errors and anomalous uses of grammar are incorporated into the Downing Street document.

Plagiarism and collusion are problems because, if undetected, they get in the way of the assessment of the intellectual abilities of students. And if we cannot assess the abilities of our students we cannot be sure of the standards of our awards. (LTC/Senate 2006) Why is it a bad thing?

Integrated approach to dealing with plagiarism 1.Make students aware of what plagiarism is. 2.Raise awareness of staff to issues connected with plagiarism such as:pressure on students of bunched cw; impossible assessments; making cheating easy 3.Have a clear procedure for dealing with cases of plagiarism. 4.Have a penalty scheme that is fair and transparent and that can act as a deterrent. 5.Improving how we detect plagiarism George MacDonald Ross - Plagiarism in Philosophy: Prevention Better than Cure

Turnitin- matching text software 1.Software developed by US company, iParadigms for detecting similarities between documents. 2.Text can entered in a variety of formats and is compared with a document database. 3.The database is extensive – material submitted to Turnitin is kept in the database; along with journals, books and the output of essay-writing websites. 4.In addition, the system gathers content from web sites based on the ISO character set (Latin script) but does not translate from foreign languages into English.

Turnitin 5.Copyright for student work submitted to Turnitin remains with the student (at least, would for UEA). 6.Turnitin requires submitted work to be identified by the name of the student and the relevant course tutor. 7.Turnitin produces an Originality report for each submitted document

Turnitin use in UK 1.Some secondary Schools use it for detecting plagiarism in GCSE work. 2.UCAS use it for personal statements on application forms - in the last round, 234 applications for medical science said: Ever since I accidentally burnt holes in my pyjamas after experimenting with a chemistry set on my eighth birthday I have always had a passion for science. 3.Most Universities have a licence for it – implementation varies considerably.

Demonstration of Turnitin by Andy Mee (CSED Learning Technology Group)

Piloting Turnitin at UEA-06/07 1.In Sept 2006 LTC approved a project of piloting the use of Turnitin with a view to considering whether it should be fully implemented for Sept AMS, CMP, DEV, ECO, ENV, FTV, MED, NAM and NBS have run or are running pilots. Applications involve work for assessment by UG, PGT and PGR students, and teaching and assessment material produced by academics. In some cases students are using Turnitin but the majority involve academic use. 3.Full reports from all the pilot projects are not available.

Lessons from pilots to date 1.DEV – students given 24 hrs notice that their cw would be put into Turnitin. i) 25% of cw items plagiarised – most spotted by normal methods but not all (e.g. plagiarised blog) ii) Turnitin missed some plagiarism – false security for marker 2.AMS – students shown Turnitin before cw deadline i) 3% of cw items plagiarised (but some students did not submit) ii) student upload not feasible for general use 3.FTV – students allowed to use Turnitin prior to submitting cw i) no plagiarism detected ii) instruction about what plagiarism is probably more useful to students than being allowed to use Turnitin for their draft cw

1.Continuation of module-based pilots 2.School based pilots? e.g. All students taking level 1 units 3.How can we pilot work-load implications for teaching offices? 4.Can we pilot anonymous cw and Turnitin? [UEA is committed to adoption of anonymous coursework marking where practicable for the 2008/9 academic year] Piloting Turnitin at UEA-07/08 We need volunteers!

Considerations for use of Turnitin at UEA 1.Anonymity 2.Who uploads documents into it? 3.How will we support staff and students? 3.Data protection requirements? 4.Efficiency in marking 5.Cultural – will the UEA experience for both staff and students be damaged? 6.Equal opportunities - any discrimination issues? 7.Should it be used in the same way in all Schools? And for all students – UG, PGT and PGR?