Turnitin.com

[futdoc08hopin]

post deleted

[AMmd]

yeah i was wondering what the deal was with turnitin...

i dont understand what you mean with this :

I am not a big fan of letting others profit from my intellectual property

ps. i think its mostly to detect plagiarism from year to year... I think they will keep track of who the author is and if it differs can spot plagiarism...

[Smurfette]

The university pays money to Turnitin.com in order to get the plagarism check. Your essay enters the database and is checked against other databases. Therefore, Turnitin.com makes money off of the work that you do (ie. your essay). As such, they are making money off your intellectual property and you do not get any money from that.

 

I know Turnitin.com was used to check essays in a number of courses at UBC (particularly arts courses). There was some talk a few years ago about a class action suit against them for profitting off of students' intellectual property (without the students receiving anything for it). However, I'm not certain whether such a suit was ever started and if so what the outcome of it might have been.

[Smurfette]

Unfortunately, I do believe that refusal to allow your essay to be put through Turnitin.com will raise red flags on your application. And although I might have some qualms about Turnitin.com, I would probably allow the school to do so.

[charmin]

Given the importance placed upon the essay in obtaining an interview at U of T meds, and given the prevalence of plagiarism/cheating in universities, I think it only makes sense for U of T to guard against plagiarism.

 

Usually there is always a stimulus responsible for change; My guess is that someone got into UT Meds by plagiarizing a friend's essay and got caught afterwards;

[bayervillager]

I remember reading in MacLean's (I think... or another news magazine) that a lawsuit has indeed been launched by a group of high school students in the States with the help of a retired lawyer doing the case pro bono.

 

I also remember the article citing the profit vs. expenditure ratio of turnitin.com. It was something like millions of dollars in profit, but very little expenses.

[whoithinkyouare]

I have publicly available published works - does this mean I have to be weary about re-using some of my autobiographical points?

[Smurfette]

Yeah, that's an interesting point. Suppose you wrote something that has been published. Or suppose you wrote an autobiographical essay, didn't make it into med school, and re-used much of the same essay for the next year. Turnitin.com would probably raise flags on your essay, but you really just "plagerized" from yourself.

[bioboy2007]

I think you're supposed to be citing yourself in that case

 

EDIT: This is for the case for work already published by you

[Dante]

i was initially really relaxed about the whole turnitin.com thing and didn't understand what people where up in arms about if they haven't done anything wrong (i'm talking about course work)... but then i realized that my university tuition is partially going to pay for this crap, and that my essay will then go into making this company money. I think I will opt out, and if they say they won't look down upon it, i'll believe them. I don't see how someone could successfully plagarize an essay about themselves anyways, so i feel the turnitin requirement is a bit silly for such an essay.

[DiscoDoc]

Dante, There are some books out there on professional school application essays. I wouldn't be surprised if at least one moron out there has tried to submit one verbatim in the past.

[utwaitlister]

I have been reading the turnitin posts and I generally agree with most of the people; it is not right for a company to profit on your work. That being said, what is the company profiting on? They are profiting on providing a "level playing field" so people who cheat/plagiarize will not be given an advantage over those who do not.

 

I have never plagiarized nor do I think it is acceptable. I want to believe that it never happens, but I have heard enough stories (from professors) to know that plagiarizism is a real issue on university campuses. Considering the importance of the U of T essay for admission into the MD program, and the difficulty of gaining admission, I am sure people have copied a successful essay from previous years.

 

The arguement that a student does not getting paid for his or her work is wrong. Yes, you do not get paid a monetary amount, but that does not mean you do not get rewarded for your effort.

 

Firstly, by submitting your essay, you are ensuring that people follow the code of conduct that you have by not cheating.

 

Secondly, you are ensuring quality/value/integrety of your task/program. An example to clarify, assuming you have two students, A and B, submit an essay for a project on government. Student A writes his own essay, while Student B does not. When the mark come back, both Student A and B get the same grade. For the summer, Student A and B get summer jobs for their local government. Student A has successful summer and gets hired back because in doing his own work, he learned important skills that applied to his job (like researching information.) the government agency was impressed with the knowledge he picked up and would be willing to hire another student from that University. Student B however, was unsuccessful as the agency was unimpressed with his skills and will never hire an student from the University.

 

Finally, which is sort of a Catch-22 , it prevents others from profiting from your work. I certainly do not want my essay copied and would much rather have company profit for money than a person for their laziness.

 

In conclusion, turnitin will decrease the number of copied essays but I fell it will not change the number of people who cheat. They will find ways around turnitin and I will not be surprised that they will resort to other avenues such as an essay service.

[Dante]

but turnitin is, due to its nature VOLUNTARY... i've spoken with professors who have told me "it's a fact that the department doesn't like to publicise, but you have a right to refuse to hand in your essay to turnitin.com, and there's nothing we can do about it. Our choice is to find an alternative assignment or way to assess them." If you know that you have plagarized, you will just refuse to use turnitin, and many who haven't plagarized and have nothing to hide will mindlessly 'turin-it-in'... so the whole process is useless and serves nothing more than to allow a company to profit off of the threat of plagarism. I understand it was novel when it first was developed and nobody knew about it, but now students are aware of its existence and are asked to submit the essay to turnitin themselves. So it may act as a deterrent (but not really, because as i've said, you can refuse to use it).

 

As for the books etc... with essay examples... how can anyone in their right mind submit one of those?? Unless you are freakishly similar to an example listed, you'll be giving them an essay about someone else... what do you say in your interview? I'm pretty sure they'll ask something about it there... also you have to reference the activities you've written in the essay... are you also going to invent fake verifiers for your plagarized essay?? I think the whole process is too personal to allow you to plagarize to a significant degree. How can you plagarize an autobiography?? It just sounds silly to me to try.

[D-Rock]

By Charmin:

Given the importance placed upon the essay in obtaining an interview at U of T meds, and given the prevalence of plagiarism/cheating in universities, I think it only makes sense for U of T to guard against plagiarism.

 

Considering the importance of the U of T essay for admission into the MD program, and the difficulty of gaining admission, I am sure people have copied a successful essay from previous years.

 

Uh oh.....

 

Just kidding.

 

If you're in second year, keep your eyes out for a survey/study I'll be doing with a classmate early next year among medical students across Canada to determine the prevalence of cheating and the need for tools like turnitin, etc. UBC uses it for an essay requirement done in our DPAS class, and many of us think it is totally unnecessary.

[utwaitlister]

Dante,

 

You make a very strong point. Turnitin does fail everyone if the school does not require all students who apply to submit their essay. I most have overlooked that point and thank you for bringing that up.

 

Do you know if the school will know that you did not submit it? If I were interviewing a student and knew that the person did not submit their work to turniitin, they better a have a really good reason as to why they did not.

[Dante]

i'm not saying only the UofT admission essay... i'm saying ANY work you submit to anyone. you have the absolute right to refuse using turnitin.com. It's not readily advertised to you, but the university cannot force you to sign away your intellectual property.

[bayervillager]

I have been reading the turnitin posts and I generally agree with most of the people; it is not right for a company to profit on your work. That being said, what is the company profiting on? They are profiting on providing a "level playing field" so people who cheat/plagiarize will not be given an advantage over those who do not.

 

Hey utwaitlister! I do agree that turnitin.come may help to provide a level playing field. I've heard of people who copied other people's labs while I was busily burning the late night oil writing my original lab, which undoubtedly really annoyed me. However... I feel that at the end of the day, it's a matter of "what are they selling?".

 

And what they are selling is a service that has as its backbone, hundreds of thousands pieces of student work that they've acquired without compensation to its original authors and only with forced consent. And that, to me at least, is profiting off of my work.

[utwaitlister]

What Dante says is a scary. I know for a fact that professors will not release your grade if you do not submit your work to turnitin, thus forcing the student to submit their work to what should be an optional service. Therefore students would have right to academic freedom infinged upon, something (academic freedom) which the University strives to perserve for its faculty when they issue tenure. To translate this into a medical ethics issue sine this is a place for people who want to be involded in the medical profession, this would be equivlent to not getting informed consent. Like I said, a scary thought. However, it could be debated, depending on your metaethical view (can I even say that?), that the good turnitin provides (e.g. level playing field) out-weight the bad (taking away a student's academic freedom). For myself, considering the argument with the information provided by Dante, I would have to agree with Dante that turnitin is problematic and U of T should make sure it has considered all the possible troubles associated with the service.

 

bayervillage, I agree with you that they are selling a service and it is wrong for them profiting off a student's work when they obtained it with forced consent. I do not however feel that a student who voluntarily turns in their work is not being rewarded. For myself, to know that my work will not be plagiarized without penalty is worth more than money, although I admit I would feel slightly cheated knowing that cheaters can still slip through the cracks without submitting their work. Personally, I think an honour code with stiff penalties would be more effective at curbing cheating.

[Dante]

I've never had a situation where i've been asked to use Turnitin.com, but I've been told by a professor (who actually was asking for my opinion on it) that they cannot force you to use it. If it came down to me, i'd probably just use it to avoid the hassle both to myself and the prof... but as far as the UofT essay goes, i haven't decided which way i'll go... leaning towards a no at this point...

[DiscoDoc]

The first time I used the service I submitted a paper on an epic Scottish poem. I used excerpts in my paper...EXTENSIVELY. Two weeks after handing in my paper I got an email to go talk to my prof. My essay was apparently 20% unoriginal text and my teacher had decided any paper over 15% was going to get a grade of zero. When we actually took a closer look at the turnitin report all the unoriginal stuff was from the footnotes or the correctly cited poem.

...

 

Now that's f'ed up!

[bayervillager]

I do not however feel that a student who voluntarily turns in their work is not being rewarded. For myself, to know that my work will not be plagiarized without penalty is worth more than money, although I admit I would feel slightly cheated knowing that cheaters can still slip through the cracks without submitting their work. Personally, I think an honour code with stiff penalties would be more effective at curbing cheating.

 

I don't think that turnitin.com gives you the benefit of having your work not being plagiarized because well... you are already guaranteed that providing that you don't give your essay/labs to somebody else!

 

The case is different if the work is being published somewhere in a book or anthology, but that's a completely different game than handing in a course assignment. But anyways, the chances of someone's English 100 essay on the themes in Romeo&Juliet or Chem 106 lab on batteries getting published is pretty low

[Smurfette]

The issue of profitting is key to te argument against turnitin.com. Most people (who don't cheat) are more than happy to comply with a safeguard against cheating. What is wrong is profitting off of the work of students. If turnitin.com was a non-profit organization, the issue would change dramatically. There is a nice article on wikipedia about the issues of turnitin.com http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Turnitin.