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Plagiarism software provokes controversy
Tirza Austin and Carrie Wells
Issue date: 11/9/07 Section: News
Professors and graduate students squared off yesterday in a University Senate meeting over the use of SafeAssign, a software available through Blackboard that automatically detects plagiarism in papers submitted by students.
Graduate students support the software, which they say would lighten their workloads as teaching assistants. But professors said SafeAssign could produce false positives and give the impression that students are automatically accused of cheating.
SafeAssign was proposed by Graduate Student Government President Laura Moore in January. Since then, Moore has been meeting with university officials to promote the program, which scans web pages to find matching content in students' papers.
In July, Moore said she met with teaching assistants and representatives from the Office of Information Technology to discuss the software. All parties agreed the software should be used, Moore said, because it could save work for graduate TAs who can spend up to half their time checking papers for plagiarism. Moore added she has heard "only positive things" from the TAs she has discussed the software with.
"It would improve academic integrity by making it much harder to get away with plagiarizing," she said.
Any student who has a paper "flagged" by SafeAssign would go through the same process students caught plagiarizing do now, which includes being referred to the Honor Council, Moore said. But the program would also allow students to check their work for unintentional plagiarism before handing it in.
"It can provide transparency because students can look and see how plagiarism could be detected," Moore said.
However, professors argue there are drawbacks to the software because students whose papers receive false positives could be unfairly penalized, said English professor Sandy Mack, who argued against the use of SafeAssign at the Senate meeting.
"I've watched other systems catch innocent students many times," he said. "Quick fixes always have some benefits, but they always have more problems."
Graduate students support the software, which they say would lighten their workloads as teaching assistants. But professors said SafeAssign could produce false positives and give the impression that students are automatically accused of cheating.
SafeAssign was proposed by Graduate Student Government President Laura Moore in January. Since then, Moore has been meeting with university officials to promote the program, which scans web pages to find matching content in students' papers.
In July, Moore said she met with teaching assistants and representatives from the Office of Information Technology to discuss the software. All parties agreed the software should be used, Moore said, because it could save work for graduate TAs who can spend up to half their time checking papers for plagiarism. Moore added she has heard "only positive things" from the TAs she has discussed the software with.
"It would improve academic integrity by making it much harder to get away with plagiarizing," she said.
Any student who has a paper "flagged" by SafeAssign would go through the same process students caught plagiarizing do now, which includes being referred to the Honor Council, Moore said. But the program would also allow students to check their work for unintentional plagiarism before handing it in.
"It can provide transparency because students can look and see how plagiarism could be detected," Moore said.
However, professors argue there are drawbacks to the software because students whose papers receive false positives could be unfairly penalized, said English professor Sandy Mack, who argued against the use of SafeAssign at the Senate meeting.
"I've watched other systems catch innocent students many times," he said. "Quick fixes always have some benefits, but they always have more problems."
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Viewing Comments 1 - 3 of 4
HeH
posted 11/09/07 @ 1:52 AM EST
I see the good intentions behind this, but I have to go against the program. As the Senate mentioned, it could provide false positives. Also, what if a student scanned their paper in and found signs of plagiarism but they didn't plagiarize anything whatsoever. (Continued…)
Kevin
posted 11/09/07 @ 10:53 AM EST
Why not make it policy that a TA reviews a flagged paper and confirms the presence of plagiarism? If students are allowed to vet their papers before they submit them that should take care of most of the false positives, and the remainder can be taken care of by the TA. (Continued…)
Christopher Conroy
posted 11/09/07 @ 11:01 AM EST
So, I think there are a great number of big problems with this software. It's not administered by the University but by a third-party, it archives student papers without our permission (and thus would violate student copyright). (Continued…)
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