Turn to Turnitin

by Jillian Zuidema (2017)

​“Turnitin is the leading originality checking and plagiarism prevention service used by millions of students and faculty, and thousands of institutions world wide.” Turnitin website

Turnitin is a website used by students and teachers to submit assignments digitally. It provides useful anti-plagiarism technology and correcting tools.

This helpful site is growing in popularity, supporting over 15,000 institutions. Teachers and students are embracing its efficiency and ease. Turnitin has set the bar with its cutting edge features. These include but are not limited to anti-plagiarism technology, spelling and grammar corrections, and peer editing capabilities.

Turnitin’s originality check is a lifesaver for students and a great fact checker for teachers. The technology highlights pieces in the student's work if it matches anything found on the internet or even in other students papers, all to prevent plagiarism. Mr.Rotes, an English teacher at Wethersfield High School said, “[Turnitin] provides a preventative measure to keep kids from making the poor choice to plagiarize whether or not it be off of someone’s paper or copy and pasting from the internet.”

Teachers can make corrections and leave comments on their student’s papers. The commenting feature allows teachers to guide their students down the right path by giving advice and constructive criticism. “I like the commenting feature on Turnitin, it helps students improve their work and helps teachers organize their thoughts and critique in a helpful manner,” said Matthew Pazdziora, a junior at Wethersfield High School. The comments do not stop at text either, Turnitin also has an option to leave voice comments. “I like the auditory feature where I can leave a note [to students],” said Rotes.

The one of the many great things about Turnitin is it's easily accessible. Students can use it just about anywhere; on a smartphone, tablet, or computer. Students can submit their papers to Turnitin and use its technology to make corrections to their work. “I like how easy it is to turn in essays from home, or any mobile device.” Said Hannah Desrochers, junior at Wethersfield High School.

Turnitin is also extremely environmentally friendly, as it helps to reduce the amount of paper waste caused by school work. “Turnitin reduces the amount of paper copies necessary for the essay, because you can turn in a rough draft, have classmate edit it online, and then turn in the final copy,” said Desrochers.  

Turnitin has created a helpful way to turn in, grade, and give feedback on assignments, while not wasting any paper. Bring this new tool into your classroom. Give turnitin a try today!

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