The document discusses supporting academic integrity policies through the use of Turnitin. It describes the presenter's experience with Turnitin as an academic integrity advisor, including establishing Turnitin at her university and revising their academic integrity policy. It also covers lessons learned, such as taking a holistic approach and viewing plagiarism as a teaching issue. Tips are provided on using Turnitin for large classes and the importance of training academics on interpretation. Challenges discussed include contract cheating and ensuring integrity in different cultural contexts.

1. Getting the most
out of Turnitin:
support for your
academic integrity
policies
Turnitin Academic Integrity
Roadshow | Dublin
Monday 21st May, 2018
Dr Sharon Flynn
National University of Ireland, Galway
@sharonlflynn

2. Me, Academic Integrity & the University
Background: Mathematics & Computer Science
1995: Lecturer in Information Technology
2003: Code of Practice for Dealing with (Student) Plagiarism
Plagiarism Advisor for Faculty of Engineering

3. Me, Academic Integrity & the University
2005: Director of the Centre for Excellence in Learning and Teaching
2006: NUI Galway introduces Turnitin
2008: Turnitin integrated into VLE
Using Turnitin with large classes [1]

4. Me, Academic Integrity & the University
2012: Revised Policy
Based on AMBeR & Plagiarism Reference Tariff [2]
Plagiarism Committee formed
Increased transparency and consistency

5. What I have learned
Lesson 1: A holistic approach is necessary
Lesson 2: Plagiarism is a teaching and learning issue
Lesson 3: Academic staff need support, training and development
Lesson 4: We need a whole university approach to Academic Integrity

6. Turnitin with large classes (2010)
Tutors were able to
• identify problems with referencing,
• support plagiarism detection
• identify excellent work
• raise issues generally around student writing
Teaching teams
• agree a consistent approach to dealing with academic integrity
• academic honesty became a shared value
• giving a consistent message to students

7. The importance of training [3]
• Focus on the teaching
• Turnitin does not detect plagiarism
• Turnitin can only be used to help detect plagiarism of
text
• Originality reports have to be interpreted
• The similarity index should never be used as a
measure of plagiarism
• You have to follow up, when you find a problem
• Give students access to originality reports in a
supported environment.

8. Academic Staff Development
• Address staff concerns [4]
• Thinking about plagiarism
• Reasons behind student plagiarism
• Contract Cheating
• Deterring plagiarism through assessment
design
• Policy & procedures

9. Bringing it
back to
assessment

10. Assessment Of/For/As Learning

11. Assessment Of/For/As Learning

12. Challenges
Challenge 1: The rise of contract cheating
Challenge 2: Integrity in the academic community
Challenge 3: Western based notion of academic integrity

13. References
[1] Flynn, Sharon (2010) Using Turnitin with large classes to support
writing. Fourth International Plagiarism Conference. Newcastle, UK.
[2] Peter Tennant and Gill Rowell (2010) Plagiarism Reference Tariff.
http://www.plagiarism.org/paper/plagiarism-reference-tariff
[3] Flynn, Sharon (2012) Getting started with Turnitin.
https://learntechgalway.blogspot.ie/2012/01/getting-started-with-
turnitin.html
[4] Flynn, Sharon (2013) Teaching staff concerns about academic
integrity and their implications for staff development International
Conference Plagiarism across Europe and Beyond. Brno, Czech
Republic.