2008 Woodie Awards
SRU cracks down on plagiarism
By Mae Kerr
Rocket Contributor
Issue date: 2/10/06 Section: News
Internet plagiarism is a widespread issue that colleges across the country are forced to deal with, including Slippery Rock University.
In an effort to decrease the number of plagiarism instances on campus, the university has recently implemented software from Turnitin.com, a plagiarism prevention component to the Blackboard system.
The software was purchased from iParadigms, a San Francisco based company that distributes its software through Turnitin.com. The software is accredited worldwide for its accuracy and speed in detecting online plagiarism.
The pursuit of purchasing Turnitin software for the university began three years ago when John A. Nichols, chairperson and professor in the history department, on behalf of The Teaching Learning Technology Roundtable (TLTR), wrote a grant for it.
The grant was submitted for a request of funding from the state system and was in turn denied because of the initial high cost of the software program.
The proposal was not reconsidered until recent negotiations were conducted between the state system and the software company, iParadigms.
After successful negotiations were completed, all 14 universities in the State System of Higher Education received Turnitin software to be integrated with their Blackboard systems.
SRU acquired a single campus license, which allows access to all professors on the campus who use Blackboard.
"The new software can be accessed by faculty through a single login at Blackboard," instructional designer Brian Danielson said. "Once students submit their work through the assignment link, it is sent directly to the Turnitin system to be reviewed for plagiarism."
Each paper submitted is passed through a huge database of published works, previously submitted student papers, and both updated and archived Internet sources. Once the evaluation is completed, the results are displayed immediately in the form of a customized report providing detailed citations of plagiarism throughout the paper.
In an effort to decrease the number of plagiarism instances on campus, the university has recently implemented software from Turnitin.com, a plagiarism prevention component to the Blackboard system.
The software was purchased from iParadigms, a San Francisco based company that distributes its software through Turnitin.com. The software is accredited worldwide for its accuracy and speed in detecting online plagiarism.
The pursuit of purchasing Turnitin software for the university began three years ago when John A. Nichols, chairperson and professor in the history department, on behalf of The Teaching Learning Technology Roundtable (TLTR), wrote a grant for it.
The grant was submitted for a request of funding from the state system and was in turn denied because of the initial high cost of the software program.
The proposal was not reconsidered until recent negotiations were conducted between the state system and the software company, iParadigms.
After successful negotiations were completed, all 14 universities in the State System of Higher Education received Turnitin software to be integrated with their Blackboard systems.
SRU acquired a single campus license, which allows access to all professors on the campus who use Blackboard.
"The new software can be accessed by faculty through a single login at Blackboard," instructional designer Brian Danielson said. "Once students submit their work through the assignment link, it is sent directly to the Turnitin system to be reviewed for plagiarism."
Each paper submitted is passed through a huge database of published works, previously submitted student papers, and both updated and archived Internet sources. Once the evaluation is completed, the results are displayed immediately in the form of a customized report providing detailed citations of plagiarism throughout the paper.
