Hello Jo,
 
During our pilot phase in 2003 the false negative problem you mention was highlighted in order to address a worrying perception among some members of staff that TII is a 'magic bullet'. In the 36 (I counted!) training sessions that followed between 2004 and 2006 this remained one of the central points made over and over again that included demonstrations (ie, here's a piece that TII won't pick up but you'll find the journal article in our eJournals and so on) and some recommendations for further searches.I recall that Life Sciences lecturers in particular felt quite discouraged at this and felt they might be better off googling, yet today they stage huge (200+ students) TII induction sessions with their first years. 
 
What seems to have happened is a realisation that using the service to 'catch cheats' is in fact not as effective as using it with students to promote better referencing practice. Due to the WebCT plugin, training sessions have dropped to 4-5/year, but the message is still very much alive on our plagiarism website and seems to really have caught on to both staff and students also due to the discussions that staff are inevitably having with their students as well. This is just anectodal, however.
 
I am just now in the midst of setting up a TII users blog forum (Google groups didn't work) where again (..and again) this will be highlighted. In other words, you are right to be concerned-there is a myth there to  be dispelled.
 
Cheers,
 
Christina
 
 
Dr Christina Mainka
Academic Development Adviser 
Napier University
Educational Development
Craighouse Campus
Edinburgh EH10 5LG
Scotland
 
Tel. 0131 455 6110 
 
Discover Napier University's new MSc Blended and Online Education programme at http://www.napier.ac.uk/ed/boe/ 
 
P Consider the environment. Please don't print this e-mail unless you really need to. 
 

________________________________

From: Plagiarism on behalf of Badge, Dr J.L.
Sent: Thu 28/02/2008 10:17
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Interesting Turnitin problem


I hope that Mike Reddy is satisfied that the discussion list is alive and well after wondering about it's demise not long ago!!!
 
I am interested in the discussions about allowing students to view and use originality reports. One of the main reasons that we have not done this so far (in biological sciences at least) is the weakness of the Turnitin database around peer reviewed journals. Our concern is that a false negative for a student that later resulted in a penalty for plagiarism (spotted by a member of staff who know the articles in their area well and spot the change in style) would cause alack of faith in the system for staff and students. Turnitin is only one of the tools we use to detect plagiarism. Students and staff would need to be aware of this if we made a draft checking service available. However, as human nature seems to suggest that we often see technical solutions as a panacea, I doubt that a range of tools/practices would get the recognition required.
 
Is this a subject specific issue? Or do other people worry about false negatives?
 
Jo 

________________________________

From: Plagiarism [mailto:[log in to unmask]] On Behalf Of Webb, Eileen
Sent: 28 February 2008 09:50
To: [log in to unmask]
Subject: Re: Interesting Turnitin problem


James
Interesting challenge, but will it prove anything? I could probably meet your challenge as well, but I'm not sure the majority of my students could, possibly in a short quote but not in a 1-2000 word report. (incidentally my area is also computing). 
Turnitin is only a tool to detect matches in text. Personally, I wouldn't use it as a matter of routine to detect plagiarism but rather to confirm suspicions. These suspicions would be alerted on reading the work and be based on my own knowledge and experience, and my own reading and awareness of my students' capabilities. I would also use other tools such as Google and textbooks.
 
regards
Eileen

________________________________

From: James A Malcolm [mailto:[log in to unmask]]
Sent: Thu 28/02/2008 08:54
To: Webb, Eileen
Cc: Plagiarism
Subject: Re: Interesting Turnitin problem



Webb, Eileen wrote:
> Jon
>
> I would suggest that if you gave someone a quote and they rephrased that
> quote so that a text-matching system such as Turnitin found no
> similarity then that person would successfully have put it into their
> own words.
>
> If this was one of my students I would probably be happy. if on reading
> the new reworded text it was relevant made sense and answered the
> question I would probably be happier still and consider they had learnt
> something. However, if they then told me they had used Turnitin
> repeatedly until the colour went away, I would suggest to them that
> there was a much more efficient way of doing it.

Eileen,

I have in the past reworded texts to avoid detection by Turnitin.  It is
not that hard.  If you would like to send me a sample quote I will
demonstrate.

I am a computer scientist, with a background in Physics, so a completely
different subject area to those would be good to make the challenge
worthwhile.

Actually I am on the side of the "educators" rather than the "police",
but the "police" do have a valid argument as I hope to demonstrate.

Looking forward to your reply!

jamesM


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