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WNCC and READI NO FEAR - Preparing to Protect and Serve

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turn it in logoWhat Is Turn-It-In?

Turnitin is a Web based service that has at its core the prevention of plagiarism, but it does much more than that. It also contains an application that allows instructors to grade and comment on papers that are submitted to the service, post the grades to a private online grade book, and lets you, the student, write and submit peer reviews from the comfort of your own easy chair.

Turnitin is currently used in thousands of schools in 85 countries around the world. Institutions such as Georgetown, the USMA at West Point, Tulane, and UCLA have all made Turnitin an integral part of the education process. Commercial enterprises such as Oprah Winfrey and Lexis/Nexis now use Turnitin to verify submissions. From its beginnings in 1996 as Plagiarism.org, TurnItIn has become the most recognized standard in the world for the prevention of Internet plagiarism.

What Turnitin Does For You

Bluntly put, Turnitin helps to level the playing field for every student. Students who plagiarize have an unfair advantage over those who don't.

Why use Turnitin? According to Who's Who in American High Schools, 84% of all college bound students admit to cheating on schoolwork, yet 95% of them never get caught.1 The Congressional Quarterly Researcher reported in September, 2003, that, "...44% of students considered minor cut-and-paste Internet plagiarism as "trivial" cheating or not cheating at all."2

It is important to realize that Turnitin does not determine if the paper violates any particular plagiarism standard. That is totally up to the instructor as he or she interprets the school's policy on academic integrity. Turnitin finds similarities between the submitted work and previously existing material. You can review WNC's Academic Integrity Policy online, and are encouraged to do so. The policy defines plagiarism at WNC.

The bottom line is that it is not our intent to play the part of the Internet Police. Rather, we want to provide WNC students with the best, fairest education experience possible.

1Turnitin Brochure, http://www.turnitin.com/static/pdf/tii_brochure.pdf
2ibid.

How Turnitin Works

So, how does Turnitin work? Here's the process:

  1. The student submits a paper electronically via an assignment that has been created inside a class by the instructor.
  2. Turnitin compares the contents of the submission with the papers in the Turnitin database.
  3. Areas of similarity are marked and referenced in an Originality Report and the document and the report are placed in the instructor's inbox.
  4. The instructor reviews the report and reviews the paper. The instructor makes a case by case decision as to whether or not a paper rises to the level of plagiarism and assigns a grade to the paper.
  5. The paper is returned to the students inbox and the grade recorded.

A visual representation of the process can be found at: The Turnitin Brochure. (Adobe Acrobat Reader required)

Further Resources


You are encouraged to take a few moments and further review the links in the left hand column of the page. The movies require that you have the Flash player installed on your computer (Click Here to obtain). The manuals require Adobe Acrobat Reader to view. (Click Here to obtain)

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