The introduction of eLearning led to a number of advancements in student assessment and evaluation. Conventional methods of assignment submission, evaluation and feedback were substituted by online workflows and were enhanced with plagiarism detection tools to assist tutors in evaluating large numbers of assignments. The increasing number of eLearning students along with the huge amount of freely accessible information on the Internet, require tools and services for tutors, to assist the grading of student assignments and check the originality of their work. In this paper, we present the methodology used for introducing and delivering a plagiarism detection service in the Open University of Cyprus eLearning platform and integrating it with the assignment submission process. Additionally, we describe the challenges faced during and after the implementation and the actions taken to train tutors in using the service in a proper way. We conclude by presenting an evaluation of the service, both for its educational and technical soundness, along with statistics of its usage during the last four years.

1. PLAGIARISM DETECTION AND PREVENTION
EXPERIENCES FROM THE OPEN UNIVERSITY OF CYPRUS
C. Rodosthenous, P. Christoforou, M. Epiphaniou,
G. Matheou, S. Mavrotheris, C. Christodoulides

2. Agenda
§ The OUC at a glance
§ What is Plagiarism?
§ Reasons that lead to plagiarism
§ Plagiarism Detection Service. Why needed?
§ Challenges during and after the implementation
§ Evaluation of the service

3. 5000 students
•Europe/Africa
•Study from distance
•Average age 35+
340 faculty members
•Work from their premises
•18 Resident
24 programmes of
study
•Undergraduate,
postgraduate, PhD
•Greek and English language
The OUC at a glance

4. Study
• Distance learning methodology
• Face-to-face meetings OR Virtual meetings
Exams and Assessment
• Mandatory assignments
• Physical presence at exams
Educational Model

5. Asynchronous
Learning
Synchronous
Learning
Coursework
submission
&
Plagiarism
detection
Video
Platform
eClass eLearning Platform

6. § Submitted electronically/Online
§ Counts for up to 50% of every course’s final grade
§ Mandatory for the fulfillment of the course
§ An average grade of 50% in all mandatory coursework is
required for every student to be qualified to attend the
final examination
Coursework

7. § Plagiarism is when you submit someone else's work as
your own work (Carroll, 2002)
§ Plagiarism is one of a number of practices deemed by
universities to constitute cheating, or in university-speak:
‘a lack of academic integrity’ (Neville, 2010)
What is Plagiarism?

8. § Inability to do the coursework
§ Lack of time
§ Difficulty to keep up
§ Do not understand the rules of citing
§ Easy access to internet sources
Reasons that lead to plagiarism

9. § Need to check previous years’ assignments
§ Manual checking became almost impossible
– Students increase
– Coursework increase
– Students from different groups copy each other’s work
– No physical contact with students
Plagiarism Detection Service. Why
needed?

10. § Web service to detect similarities from various sources
§ Support all the popular file formats
§ Support both Greek and English language coursework
§ Secure coursework submission
§ Seamless integration to eClass eLearning
Platform
Technical Requirements

11. Test dataset
T1: content from English and Greek news sites
T2: content from open repositories with thesis and dissertations in
Greek language
T3: content from the OUC’s institutional repository
T4: content from assignments added to the plagiarism detection
database
T5: content from publishers that the OUC has access to
T6: content from books used for teaching in OUC courses
T7: source-code from sites with examples (e.g., Microsoft Developer
Network, php.net, etc.)
Testing and Demonstration

12. Testing and demonstration
Plagiarism detection service
T1 T2 T3 T4 T5 T6 T7
Ephorus1 56% 47% 85% 90% 46% 35% 48%
Turnitin2 88% 63% 79% 92% 61% 53% 37%
[1] https://www.ephorus.com/
[2] http://turnitin.com/

13. Service deployment and integration
§ Activation of the service and content migration.
§ Integration to the eClass eLearning Platform.
§ Preparation of training material and educator training.
§ Pilot phase initiation.
Plagiarism detection service

14. Current Status

15. § Similarities percentage include content that is part of the
student’s coursework (title, instructions, pre-defined
coursework templates, multiple choice question
templates etc)
§ Resubmitting an assignment is also sometimes detected
as plagiarism, since educators forget to withdraw the
first submission from the reference database
Identified issues

16. Evaluation of the service

17. Evaluation of the service (2)

18. 2011 2015
Number of assignment activities in eClass 386 1439
Number of coursework submissions 14071 30208
Average grading time (in days) 17 13
Evaluation of the service (3)
§ Average coursework grading time decreased

19. § A plagiarism detection tool in a university is far from
being a cure for the phenomenon of plagiarism
§ Aims in building a healthy scientific culture and academic
honesty for future scientists and to act as a prevention
method for students to present not original work
Conclusions

20. More information….
• Christos T. Rodosthenous
• Email: christos.rodosthenous@ouc.ac.cy
• Georgia Matheou
• Email: georgia.matheou@ouc.ac.cy
• WWW: http://www.ouc.ac.cy