Steve is right in that turnitin gives some false positives. For instance, if a
student types a space between her quote mark and the quoted text, that text will
show up as a copied and unacknowledged passage. But the reports turnitin gives
are so clearly laid out that it's fast to sort out the false positives from the
truly copied and unacknowledged text.

Judy

> ----------
> From: Steve Krause
> Reply To: TechRhet@yahoogroups.com
> Sent: Sunday, November 24, 2002 5:59 PM
> To: TechRhet@yahoogroups.com
> Subject: RE: [TechRhet] Turnitin.com
>
> Tari wrote in part:
>
> >On Sun, 24 Nov 2002, Steve Krause wrote:
> >
> >> Second, I'm not sure that the other student who got his or her stuff
> >> from 9 different web sites was plagiarizing exactly. Technically,
> >> yes, but was it a case of "theft" or a case of not knowing how to
> >> cite sources? I'm constantly amazed how so many of my students,
> >> freshman to master's students, don't realize that you have to follow
> >> the rules of citing sources and giving credit where credit is due. I
> >> get this kind of "plagiarism" all the time, but these are instances
> >> where I tell the student they've got to rewrite.
> >
> >
> >Actually, in a sentence that you cut, Judy says that both students
> >admitted that they plagiarized, one because of not having the time and the
> >other because of not taking the time. So leaving aside the facts that we
> >haven't seen the paper and that Judy can probably tell plagiarism from a
> >mistake, I think if a student says, "I ran out of time so I copied my
> >sources," we can pretty much call that plagiarism, and not just
> >"technically."
>
> Oops-- my bad, you're right.
>
> >
> >But anyhow, let me see if I can explain what I think is really interesting
> >(in kind of a scary way) about this thread:
> >
> >Ed asks for turnitin users to talk about turnitin.com. Instead of
> >information about turnitin.com, he gets a bunch of advice from people who
> >don't use turnitin about how he should be teaching, how his assignments
> >should be constructed--even though we haven't seen his assignments or been
> >in his class, and that's not what he asked about.
> >
> >Finally, Judy comes along and addresses Ed's actual question, explaining
> >how and why she uses turnitin.
> >
> >So now Judy gets advice about *her* teaching!
>
> Well, three quick thoughts:
>
> * I didn't jump into this thread until this morning, so I'm not
> one of those folks you're talking about. But...
>
> * I *have* used turnitin before, albeit a few years ago (I'm
> sure the service has improved), and I was not impressed. I tried it
> out on a "demo" basis of some sort, tried running through some of my
> documents, things like my dissertation I believe, and it had said I
> had plagiarized. Or something like that.
>
> If EMU bought the institutional contract so I could use it whenever I
> wanted to, well sure, I'd probably use it once in a while. But if
> someone asked me (highly unlikely!) if EMU should buy it, what I
> would probably say are things like what people have said: it
> probably isn't worth the money, given other search engines out there,
> and it would be better to concentrate on assignments that discourage
> plagiarism.
>
> * I don't mean to sound like the wise teaching adviser to Judy
> or anyone else. Sorry if it came off that way. I was just thinking
> about this out loud in relation to my own teaching. Which will lead
> to something else I'll write here in a second in response to
> something Judy wrote...
>
> --Steve
> --
> Steven D. Krause
> Associate Professor, Department of English Language and Literature
> Eastern Michigan University * 614G Pray-Harrold Hall
> Ypsilanti, MI 48197 * 734-487-1363 * http://krause.emich.edu
>
>
>
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>
>
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>
>


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