Using Turnitin with Canvas
Two Turnitin Tools Integrated with Canvas
Canvas features two ways to integrate Turnitin plagiarism-checking technology into your assignments:
- Turnitin External Tool: The Turnitin External Tool is available in Canvas. This tool allows you access to Turnitin’s full suite of evaluation tools, including Turnitin’s online grading tools (Feedback Studio) and peer review system (PeerMark). When using the External Tool, you create the assignment and your students submit to the assignment from within Canvas, but all use of rubrics, feedback tools, and scoring takes place in Turnitin.
- Turnitin Plagiarism Framework: New in Canvas, for instructors who would like to receive a Turnitin similarity report on their student submissions while continuing to use Canvas’s built-in tools for rubrics, feedback, peer review and scoring. Incorporating the Plagiarism Framework into a Canvas assignment is quick and easy, and you do not need to learn a whole new suite of tools in order to do your grading.
Still not sure which tool will best meet your needs? See this External Tool vs. Plagiarism Framework feature comparison chart.
The below articles will give step-by-step instructions for setting up and grading assignments using both of these tools.
Feel free to give the link to our Using Turnitin in Canvas as a Student documentation.
See also:
What about detecting work done with generative AI like ChatGPT?
A wide array of AI detection tools exists; in fact, such tools are becoming ubiquitous. However, their accuracy varies considerably. The creators of many of these tools claim extremely high accuracy rates in spotting AI-generated content. It is not unusual to see claims of 98-99%+ accuracy. However, when evaluated by third parties, most of these tools also have a high rate of false positives. Even AI detectors with a great record in spotting AI generated content often flag human-written text as AI-generated. False positives carry the risk of loss of student trust, confidence and motivation, bad publicity, and potential legal sanctions.
Many of the software companies involved refuse to offer a specific false positive rate for their products.
On April 4, 2023, Turnitin released an AI detector that was available to Pitt faculty through its existing suite of tools. Although Turnitin claimed that its tool was more accurate than other AI detectors, some faculty voiced concerns about accuracy and usefulness. Based on our own testing at the Teaching Center, and discussions with other institutions, the Teaching Center decided not to endorse or support the use of this tool.
As of June 2023, there have been two new developments. First, Turnitin has now publicly acknowledged that its AI detection tool has a higher false positive rate than the company originally asserted. However, they have not disclosed a new false positive rate estimate. In addition, Turnitin has now updated their application so that the Teaching Center has the capability to disable this specific application within the suite of Turnitin tools.
Based on our professional judgement, the Teaching Center has concluded that current AI detection software is not yet reliable enough to be deployed without a substantial risk of false positives and the consequential issues such accusations imply for both students and faculty. Use of the detection tool at this time is simply not supported by the data and does not represent a teaching practice that we can endorse or support.
For all these reasons, the Teaching Center will disable the AI detection tool in Turnitin effective immediately.
Currently, the Teaching Center does not endorse or support the use of any AI detection tools. We will continue to advise Pitt’s faculty about the value of AI tools as they continue to evolve, and we will work closely with all instructors on appropriate use of generative AI tools in the classroom and the appropriate best practices for managing potential abuses of this technology. To request a consultation to discuss how to talk to students about the ethical use of AI tools or design assessments to mitigate academic integrity issues, email the Teaching Center at teaching@pitt.edu.