Teachers acquire new tool which checks for plagiarism and allows quick feedback | by CARA MCCLAIN

With the browser open, type in the web address and log on. Find the assignment listed under the class’s name and submit the essay.

In a matter of seconds, it’s finished.

This process will become very familiar for many STA students this year because teachers are using Turnitin.com, a website used to edit, revise and submit assignments.

Turnitin.com is a website that checks papers for plagiarism and properly cited sources from magazines, newspapers, encyclopedias, web documents, and other students’ papers. This website also serves as a way for teachers to easily give students feedback on their assignments.

In 1996, University of California, Berkley researchers first started Turnitin.com, then known as Plagiarism.org. As an initiative to prevent students from reusing previous students’ papers. Plagiarism.org was the world’s first internet-based plagiarism detection service according to Turnitin.com. Now in 106 different countries, students and teachers from over 6,500 schools use it.

From Plagiarism.org, Turnitin.com and iThenticate.com, a similar plagiarism checking website, branched off in 2003. According to iThenticate.com, the distinction between Turnitin.com and the other two websites is it’s goal to help facilitate the entire writing cycle as well as checking for plagiarism.

However, this website is not available for free. A school can purchase a single campus license, a multiple campus license, a department license or an individual license. STA bought a license for it last year.

To begin, teachers must create a class profile online and a student can then make an account and sign up for their class.

‘[Turnitin.com can be] somewhat time consuming for the teacher upfront,’ academic principal Barbara McCormick said. ‘Classes that are doing a lot of writing would benefit from this.’

English teacher Carrie Jacquin is using Turnitin.com for her students’ benefit and to organize the papers she grades.

‘I see it as a great tool,’ Jacquin said. ‘I won’t have stacks and stacks of papers to take home.’

Jacquin likes how it will also keep a portfolio for her students, so by the end of the year, they can easily find their first semester papers. Of all her assignments, Jacquin plans on requiring her students to hand in four to five papers through the site.

However, McCormick envisions teachers to use it much more.

‘A long term goal [for Turnitin.com] is that we use it for all writing assignments,’ McCormick said.

Sophomore Emory Hall, who is using Turnitin.com for social studies teacher Richard Shrock’s assignments, also sees the benefit of this website.

‘[Turnitin.com is] environmentally friendly because you don’t waste paper, and it’s easy,’ Hall said.

According to Turnitin.com, their calculations show that all the papers turned in electronically can save over 10,000 trees every year. If these papers were stacked one on top of the other, the stack would reach up to six miles high which is taller than Mount Everest.

Sophomore Kate Rohr, who is using the website for Mr. Stephen Himes’ Accelerated World Literature class, also sees Turnitin.com’s environmental benefit, but doesn’t like the website.

“All this online stuff freaks me out,” Rohr said. “There’s just a lot of passwords to remember, and I’m bad at remembering stuff. So it’s difficult for me.”

Rohr doesn’t think the website will affect her citing behaviors as it could affect others.

“I don’t try to plagiarize,” Rohr said. “[Turnitin.com] just makes me that much more careful, but I try to be careful already.”

Rohr believes it will prevent plagiarism in others.

“I think people will be less willing to try to find [ways to cheat],” Rohr said. “You can get zeros easily for [plagiarizing at STA] and especially in college. You can get in a lot of trouble for it.”

However, Jacquin thinks giving feedback directly on the student’s paper is the website’s most important feature.

‘The misconception about Turnitin.com is that it’s a ‘gotcha’ tool to catch cheating,’ Jacquin said.

Jacquin and Hall both agree Turnitin.com will cause students to become more aware of citing sources correctly.

‘[I really like how] you can re-turn in your document if you see that you made a mistake,’ Hall said.

McCormick sees students benefiting from this website because many colleges use it or websites similar to it to turn papers in. Because STA is a college preparatory school, becoming more familiar with tools colleges use will be helpful to students McCormick said.

Hall has concerns about handing in assignments online and having something go wrong.

“Someone last week lost their document,” Hall said. “It didn’t go to the teacher.”

Rohr also has worries about losing her papers online.

“I’m not a very technical person,” Rohr said. “I’m always freaked out [that] my computer won’t upload my paper or that it will crash.”

McCormick advises students to print hard copies of their papers because technology can never be perfect.

‘Don’t trust [Turnitin.com] wholeheartedly,’ McCormick said. ‘There’s always a probability that technology could fail.’