Anti-plagiarism software
in an Irish University:
three years later
Angelica Risquez, Centre for Teaching
and Learning, University of Limerick
[email protected]
Outline
• Anti-plagiarism software and
academic honesty
• Our experience since 2005
• Towards good practices
Anti-plagiarism software and
academic honesty
•
•
•
•
Widespread?
Internet-related awareness
Increased institutional focus
Anti-plagiarism software
Anti-plagiarism software
and academic honesty
• Ethical debate: “deterring plagiarism
before it happens” (www.turnitin.com)
VS “pedagogic placebo” (Carbone,
2001) and potentially purely punitive
(Sutherland-Smith and Carr, 2005).
• Practical
debate:
effectiveness
assumed rather than confirmed
Our experience so far
• Turnitin.com: plagiarism prevention; online
marking; peer review and e-portfolio.
• Adopted at UL in 2005, training and
support provided by the CTL (aprox 150
faculty).
• Voluntary and promoting a positive,
proactive attitude towards plagiarism
prevention
Our experience so far
Our experience so far:
Statistics
• 214 instructor accounts
• 7,966 student accounts (additional 5,561
accounts now deleted)
• 11,882 submissions, 9,809 originality
reports
• 1,772 peer reviews
• 226 papers marked online
Our experience so far:
Student accounts
3000
2500
2000
1500
1000
500
0
Sem2
05/06
Sem1
06/07
Sem2
06/07
Sem1
07/08
Sem2
07/08
Sem1
08/09
Sem2
08/09
Our experience so far:
Representation
100%
80%
60%
Enrolment
Sem2 08/09
40%
20%
0%
College of
Education
and Health
Sciences
College of
Engineering
and Science
College of
Arts and
Humanities
Kemmy
Business
School
TOTAL
Our experience so far:
Originality reports
7000
6297
6000
5000
4000
3000
2000
1445
978
769
1000
320
0
75-100%
50-74%
25-49%
0-24%
< 20 words
!!! Not representative of actual plagiarism levels
Our experience so far:
Differing practices
80
73
Submitted without
creating student
accounts
Submitted creating
student accounts
70
60
50
48
40
30
20
19
No submissions
10
0
(Data early 2008, 140 instructors)
Our experience so far:
Differing practices (2)
Frequency
More than 8 student accounts (full class)
22
Less than 8 student accounts
26
Total
48
… only 18% of 140 organised submissions
with the whole class
Towards good practices
• Differing practices emerge: proactive,
encouraging students to submit VS ah-hoc
use
• How these relate to approaches to
plagiarism prevention, academic
performance, student learning, and
attitudes towards academic honesty?
• Are submissions of “suspicious”
assignments related to ad-hoc approaches
which may alienate students and provoke
resistance, fear, etc.?
Towards good practices (2)
… It seems that I am the only one that requested
that students submit all of their texts to Turnitin. I
have found them reluctant to do so, but I’m not sure
why. At this point, only a few have been exposed for
documentation violation through Turnitin.
… I’m finding that these first year students are,
understandably, uncertain about what kind of
information needs to be cited.
… For the few students who did attend tutorials and
submit regularly, I think the combination of essay
writing tutorials, feedback and originality
verification was a boon of a benefit. We’ll see.
Lawrence Cleary, Writing Centre, UL
Towards good practices (3)
• Case study with engineering class
(Ledwith&Risquez, 2008) showed
decreased level of plagiarism because the
lecturer integrated it in a coherent
prevention policy including:
– Workshop with students and training on
appropriate referencing
– Feedback to the class on results from system
– Tackling individual cases and allowing
resubmission
Towards good practices (4)
• Survey of student perceptions
(n=787) showed no link between
knowing about/submitting to Turnitin
and ethical views about plagiarism
and reported engagement in
plagiarism
Towards good practices (5)
• Indications that the system may be
best used with proactive practices
which emphasise writing skills and
referencing
• E.g. students are encouraged to
submit their work through the
semester, allowed to see their own
originality reports, available
tutor/peer support
References
Carbone, N. (2001). Turnitin.com, a Pedagogic Placebo for
Plagiarism [Electronic Version]. Technical Notes. Retrieved
10th October 2007 from
http://bedfordstmartins.com/technotes/techtiparchive/tti
p060501.htm.
Ledwith, A., y Risquez, A. (2008). Using Anti-Plagiarism
Software to Promote Academic Honesty in the Context of
Peer Reviewed Assignments. Studies in Higher Education,
33(4).
Sutherland-Smith, W., y Carr, D. (2005). Turnitin.com:
Teachers' perspectives of anti-plagiarism software in
raising issues of educational integrity. JUTLP, 3(1b).