Turnitin is a Web-based plagiarism detection service that is now available to University of Minnesota instructors via a link in WebVista or directly through the Turnitin company Web site. Instructors can have their students submit written work to this service so it can be checked against Turnitin's databases. The databases include:
- current and archived versions of the publicly available Internet,
- commercial databases of journal articles and periodicals, and
- the company's own database of student work previously submitted to the service.
After student work is checked against the databases Turnitin produces an "Originality Report" that shows matching sequences of words in the submitted assignment, any matching sources, and the percentage of matching words in the report.
Access Turnitin
Instructors can access, and provide students with access to, Turnitin through WebVista course sites or directly through the Turnitin Web site.
Via WebVista
- Select the Build tab in your WebVista course site.
- Select the More Tools link in the menu on the left side of the page.
- An expanded menu will appear. Select the Turnitin Assignment link.
Via Turnitin.com
The Office of the Senior Vice President for Academic Affairs and Provost obtained a University of Minnesota, Twin Cities campus-wide site license for the turnitin.com Web site that also enables all instructors to use it free of charge. Information about accessing this site is sent to all faculty members by e-mail every fall. For more information contact Leslie Zenk at zenklr@umn.edu.
Set Up Turnitin Assignments
Separate Turnitin assignments must be created for each paper assignment. When you select the Turnitin Assignment link in a WebVista site, an expanded menu will appear that enables you to create a new assignment or select one from an inventory, just as you would when you use other WebVista tools such as Assessments, Assignments, and Discussions.
When you create a new Turnitin assignment, a window will appear (see Figure 1). Enter an assignment title, point value, start and end dates, and special assignment instructions.
Figure 1: A portion of the Turnitin Assignment options window in WebVista (see entire screenshot).
The default options screen for Turnitin does not show all the options that are available. We recommend that you select Yes in the "Show advanced assignment options?" field to better customize the assignment for your preferences.
There are two main items that you need to decide regarding the assignment.
- What sources will be checked against the student submission? The "student paper database" option requires you to submit the assignments to Turnitin paper database. Because these assignments remain in a commercial database, there is dispute as to whether this practice violates students' intellectual property rights.
- Will you allow students to view their own originality report?
To learn more about issues related to these options, as well as additional plagiarism prevention strategies, support, services, examples, resources, and research, see the Turnitin page on the DMC site.
For further information about Turnitin assignment options, select the Help button located in the upper left hand corner of a WebVista course site window.