Turnitin in practice at the university
Memphis' Channel 5 discusses the use of turnitin at the University of Memphis:
Here's how it works: When a student finishes a paper, he or she sends it in by computer to the Turnitin program set up by the university. The software checks the paper against a database of billions of articles. If anything is copied from another piece of work, the paper is returned to the professor with red marks.
Of course, turnitin does not detect copying; it detects similarities of the submitted article to the articles in the database. Turnitin does not know if the student copied, or "independently created." Given that university professors provide assignments in a relatively small number of topics (e.g., the scaffold business in business ethics), sooner or later, the database will fill up with all reasonably foreseeable ways of expressing thoughts on the small number of topics.
Under some embodiments of turnitin, the student can preview what turnitin finds. The Channel 5 report noted:
"The way I've used it, the system is open, so the students can submit their papers before they turn them in," said University of Memphis English professor Dr. Joshua Phillips.
Under his system, Phillips said, students can get their papers back, see where the red marks are, and then make the necessary changes before turning in the final product.
In an earlier post about the Coulter business, IPBiz had the text:
BARRIE: Look, I think the examples you've given today are the same sort of things that would flunk an English 1A student, you know, writing some term paper on the same type of subjects.
There is a similar issue about facts used in the book:
In a chapter entitled "The Holiest Sacrament, Abortion" there's a 25-word passage straight out of literature from Planned Parenthood. It had been taken virtually word-for-word, it is factual, concerns the president of the Mississippi Baptist Convention, but there is no credit given. In another chapter, entitled "The Creation Myth," Coulter manages another long passage, this one 24 words, that is neither hers nor attributed, this time in a passage about the galactic ruler Xenu.
IPBiz also noted differences between plagiarism and copyright infringement.
Here's how it works: When a student finishes a paper, he or she sends it in by computer to the Turnitin program set up by the university. The software checks the paper against a database of billions of articles. If anything is copied from another piece of work, the paper is returned to the professor with red marks.
Of course, turnitin does not detect copying; it detects similarities of the submitted article to the articles in the database. Turnitin does not know if the student copied, or "independently created." Given that university professors provide assignments in a relatively small number of topics (e.g., the scaffold business in business ethics), sooner or later, the database will fill up with all reasonably foreseeable ways of expressing thoughts on the small number of topics.
Under some embodiments of turnitin, the student can preview what turnitin finds. The Channel 5 report noted:
"The way I've used it, the system is open, so the students can submit their papers before they turn them in," said University of Memphis English professor Dr. Joshua Phillips.
Under his system, Phillips said, students can get their papers back, see where the red marks are, and then make the necessary changes before turning in the final product.
In an earlier post about the Coulter business, IPBiz had the text:
BARRIE: Look, I think the examples you've given today are the same sort of things that would flunk an English 1A student, you know, writing some term paper on the same type of subjects.
There is a similar issue about facts used in the book:
In a chapter entitled "The Holiest Sacrament, Abortion" there's a 25-word passage straight out of literature from Planned Parenthood. It had been taken virtually word-for-word, it is factual, concerns the president of the Mississippi Baptist Convention, but there is no credit given. In another chapter, entitled "The Creation Myth," Coulter manages another long passage, this one 24 words, that is neither hers nor attributed, this time in a passage about the galactic ruler Xenu.
IPBiz also noted differences between plagiarism and copyright infringement.
posted by Lawrence B. Ebert at 12:08 PM
0 Comments:
Post a Comment
<< Home