688
Opening Pandora’s box of academic integrity: Using
plagiarism detection software
Sue Mulcahy and Christine Goodacre
Flexible Education Unit
University of Tasmania
Academic integrity issues are currently a major focus of concern at most tertiary institutions.
This paper details the strategic framework for work at the University of Tasmania (UTAS) for
management of these issues. It focuses on the introduction of plagiarism detection software
which has served to highlight the wide variety of issues associated with academic integrity and
the importance of embedding good practice on the part of both staff and students. The paper
reports on the Pandora’s box of implementation issues – legal, workload, training and support –
that have emerged and the strategies being used to manage these, as part of the project. It
recommends the use of a model which focuses on an educative approach to the management of
academic integrity, as well as including mechanisms for identifying and discouraging
plagiarism, and where it occurs, proceeding against it as academic misconduct. Many of the
issues raised by the project have challenged the ‘comfort zones’ of students, staff and university
academic administration. These are being managed both through the approaches being used in
the pilot and the project governance adopted.
Keywords: plagiarism, academic integrity, plagiarism detection software, Turnitin, institutional
framework, implementation
Background
The management of academic integrity and plagiarism issues within universities has been undergoing
review in recent years and the strategies used to address these issues extended. UTAS is no exception.
For the purpose of this paper the term ‘academic integrity’ is used in a broad sense, referring to mastery
of the art of scholarship. Scholarship involves researching, understanding and building upon the work of
others and requires that credit is given where it is due and the contribution of others to your own
intellectual efforts is acknowledged. At its core, academic integrity requires honesty. This involves being
responsible for ethical scholarship and for knowing what academic dishonesty is and how to avoid it.
Plagiarism, in Webster’s dictionary (1993, p. 1728) is defined as “to steal and to pass off as one's own
(the idea or words of another); use (a created production) without crediting the source; to commit literary
theft; present as new and original an idea or product derived from an existing source”.
The Centre for Study for Higher Education at the University of Melbourne suggests in their 2002 report
(James, McInnis & Devlin, 2002) that academic integrity can be managed through the introduction of and
commitment to four strategies, all of which are underpinned by the central principle of ensuring fairness:
1. A collaborative effort to recognise and counter plagiarism at every level from policy, through
faculty/division and school/department procedures, to individual staff practices;
2. Thoroughly educating students about the expected conventions for authorship and the appropriate use
and acknowledgment of all forms of intellectual material;
3. Designing approaches to assessment that minimise the possibility for students to submit plagiarised
material, while not reducing the quality and rigour of assessment requirements;
4. Installing highly visible procedures for monitoring and detecting cheating, including appropriate
punishment and re-education measures.
UTAS has found this a useful reference point for the management of these issues at an institutional level
and in 2001 it established a working party to review our framework and make recommendations as
appropriate.
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The outcome of work during 2001 – 2002 of the working party can be summarised as follows:
• A statement on Plagiarism was developed, which was to be included in all unit outlines.
• A generic University assignment cover sheet was introduced, to include an attestation that the work
presented is the student’s own.
• Current sanctions were reviewed. The relevant Ordinance, of Student Discipline, was reviewed in
2003, for use by heads of schools (as responsible officers) in cases of academic misconduct. This
recommendation was consistent with those of academic integrity expert, Jude Carroll, who
recommends the development of a set of penalties and the appointment of a person at the departmental
level as a responsible officer for their assignment (Carroll, 2002). At UTAS, all cases of academic
misconduct that incur penalties are recorded on a central database, managed by Academic
Administration.
• The Academic Registrar was identified as a reference person for heads of school, for queries on
appropriate penalties. In this way we sought to manage potential issues of inconsistency in the
application of penalties.
• Resources were developed to assist students and staff manage issues of academic integrity and
plagiarism, both unintentional and intentional. This includes information on how to acknowledge
sources and for staff, how to set assessment items which reduce the possibility of deliberate
plagiarism. These resources can be found on the university’s Academic Integrity website
(http://www.utas.edu.au/tl/supporting/academicintegrity/index.html). It should be noted that in
developing these resources and working to embed them in practice, the Flexible Education Unit (FEU)
focussed on a developmental approach. We believe it is important to develop a framework which
focuses on educative strategies and processes whilst covering punitive issues.
This working party also supported the introduction of an auditing mechanism in the form of plagiarism
detection software, to assist in ensuring that the work submitted by students is their own.
In 2003 the FEU took up this work and applied a project management methodology to its continuation.
To ensure continued high level support for the project, the Pro Vice-Chancellor Teaching and Learning
(T&L) took on the role of project sponsor. The project steering committee consisted of the Director FEU
as Chair, the project leader, Academic Registrar, Dean of Graduate Studies, two student and academic
staff representatives, a representative from the central IT unit, plus the Library as observer. While the
project focused on the introduction of plagiarism detection software – Turnitin – it also involved a further
revision of policy and support issues. We were not sure what other issues might arise, administrative,
policy or legal, and the role of the Steering Committee was to provide advice on their management as
well as generally oversee the project.
Plagiarism detection software: Why Turnitin?
There is a wide range of ‘solutions’ to plagiarism currently available. They range from using search
engines such as Google to identify offending papers, to PC and internet based options. Applications such
as web based search engines like Google, Web Wombat and Answers have been no-cost solutions used by
individual teachers to check suspicious essays. While these have provided some results, they come with
serious limitations and in 2003 UTAS decided to implement the application, Turnitin.
The Cooperative Action by Victorian Academic Libraries (CAVAL) supports Turnitin and provides
consultancy, training and help desk services for it. Turnitin is currently used at 28 Australian tertiary
institutions and in nearly 50 countries world wide, including extensive use in the UK through the JISC
Plagiarism Detection Service and in the US at both the tertiary and secondary level.
What is Turnitin?
Turnitin is a text matching system, which compares a submitted document with text located on “an
Internet database of over 4.5 billion (web) pages…millions of published books and journals from
ProQuest…over 10 million papers already submitted to Turnitin” (Turnitin tour, 2004). A report is
produced on each document submitted, highlighting sections of text that match with an entry in Turnitin’s
databases. Matched text is highlighted using colours, which also indicates the originating source of the
match. There are two formats for viewing the Turnitin reports, either print (Figure 1) or side by side
(Figure 2) version.
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Figure 1: Turnitin report, print version format, used with permission
After a document is submitted to Turnitin, it is added to Turnitin’s database. This enables a historical
archive of submitted documents to be built up and included in later checking. An additional function of
collecting documents in the database is the building up of references taken from printed material. Print
based material is not currently available to Turnitin through any other source.
Turnitin does not identify all potential cases of plagiarism, as its database does not contain all web pages,
electronic journals, published works or individually produced works and it cannot match paraphrased text.
It is only one tool in an overall strategy for managing academic integrity being implemented at the
university.
Because Turnitin only reports on the degree of text matching, it is necessary for individual lecturers to
review Turnitin’s reports to determine the actual level of plagiarism. Turnitin does not differentiate
between correctly cited references and unacknowledged copying. What it does provide is a ranking of
assignments, according to the level of text matching it has found with other sources, highlighting those
assignments that are most likely to include plagiarism.
Project strategies
The implementation of Turnitin required the development of strategies in the areas of policy,
management, support, communications and evaluation.
UTAS joined the CAVAL Plagiarism Detection Consortium, established across Australia and New
Zealand to achieve better educational outcomes in the area of plagiarism reduction. Membership is free
and the consortium provides discounts on services and software and will provide software support
through its Turnitin Help Desk and initial training.
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Figure 2: Turnitin report, side by side version, used with permission
Key Performance Indicators for the pilot are as follows:
• Appropriate policies and procedures to support use of Turnitin and to address cases of plagiarism
• Implementation of user administration processes prior to the pilot
• Attendance at training and usage of resources and support services
• Usage levels of Turnitin by stakeholders and assessments of usefulness.
Critical success factors were identified as the following:
• Approval for the introduction of an amendment to the University Statement on Plagiarism to reflect
the fact that student work might be submitted to Turnitin.
• The timely development of training and support services for staff to use the software.
• Easy to use system to register and use the software.
• The support of the senior executive and academic committees for the use of plagiarism detection
software.
• Student acceptance of the use of plagiarism detection software, for plagiarism detection and peer
review of assignments.
Key strategies can be summarised as follows:
• Policy revision: Prior to introducing Turnitin, the University’s Plagiarism Statement and assignment
cover sheet were amended. For 2004, the Plagiarism Statement was changed to inform students that
assignments might be submitted to plagiarism detection software. The assignment cover sheet was
also updated to include this information.
• Administrative processes: Responsibility for the management of Turnitin accounts and passwords has
been devolved as much as possible. The Turnitin account ids and passwords for Faculties are managed
and distributed centrally. Unit coordinators are responsible for creating and distributing the Turnitin
course ids and passwords for their units. Staff and students are responsible for setting up their own
Turnitin user account ids and passwords. Over time, responsibility for management and distribution of
Faculty accounts and passwords are likely to be distributed to appropriate Faculty representatives.
• Provision of Training: The CAVAL Plagiarism Consortium provided a train the trainer session at the
start of the pilot. Training resources have since been developed for staff and students, covering both
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how to use the software and related academic integrity issues. For staff this has included training in
strategies to discourage plagiarism and university policy and procedures relating to academic
integrity. For students it has included resources on academic integrity and how this relates to using
both the text and ideas of other authors in their work.
• Communications plan: This has included briefings to senior staff on academic integrity issues, the
running of information sessions and the promotion of the multiple uses of Turnitin to staff and
students through internal university publications.
• Conducting and evaluating a pilot: The piloting of Turnitin in self selected schools and the evaluation
of its use and the associated resources. The results of the pilot are discussed later in this paper.
• Investigation of issues: Throughout the pilot communication was encouraged between the pilot
participants and project leader. Issues raised either by students or staff were followed up. These
included several legal issues for example: clarification of the status of Turnitin reports as evidence in
disciplinary proceedings and IP issues regarding student’s work being stored on third party databases
off site.
• Reporting: Reports will be developed as a result of the pilot evaluation, to the University’s Teaching
& Learning Committee, Heads of Schools and Associate Deans T&L, on trends and issues in the use
of Turnitin.
• Determining Turnitin’s appropriateness for UTAS: As a result of evaluating the Turnitin pilot, the
effectiveness of Turnitin within the UTAS environment for assisting with the management of
academic integrity and plagiarism will be determined.
• Recommending models of use: Models of use of Turnitin for staff and students will be recommended,
to ensure effective and efficient use within the UTAS environment.
Semester 1 pilot 2004
The Semester one pilot ran from 19
th
April till 28
th
June 2004. There were initially 16 lecturers, 17 units
and approximately 1,400 students involved in the pilot. Each faculty was represented as well as units
from 1
st
to 3
rd
year and from each major Tasmanian campus. During the pilot 13 lecturers made use of
Turnitin in 15 units with approximately 1020 student assignments submitted. Units from 1
st
to 3
rd
year
were involved and from all major Tasmanian campuses. Not all faculties had the level of participation we
had hoped for and this is intended to be addressed in second semester.
The pilot aimed to investigate issues related to:
• administration, resourcing and support of the use of Turnitin
• the use of Turnitin by students, staff and other stakeholders
• training of staff and students in issues related to academic integrity and plagiarism
The pilot was evaluated by:
• investigating difficulties experienced by participants
• investigating workload implications
• analysis of enquiries to the Service Desk, FEU Help Line and CAVAL Help Desk
• feedback from training courses
• a questionnaire for student users of Turnitin
• a focus group of students that had not used Turnitin
• a focus group of staff participants
• Turnitin’s statistics report on submissions
Preliminary findings and issues –Semester 1 pilot 2004
In two units where the lecturer submitted the student’s work to Turnitin, the rate of plagiarism detected
was approximately that reported in the 2002 study of 6 Victorian Universities, 14% (O’Connor, 2003).
There is no indication from the pilot that the level of plagiarism at UTAS is significantly different from
that present at other Australian Universities, or that UTAS students are not using the same resources
(Carroll, 2002) as students throughout the world, in plagiarising work.
Turnitin did not highlight all occurrences of plagiarism detected in units where the lecturer submitted the
student’s work. Markers in these three units identified cases of plagiarism not highlighted by Turnitin.
These were not identified by Turnitin because a website was not included in Turnitin’s database and
copied work had been paraphrased by students. However in two of these units, Turnitin highlighted the