Can the similarity report be shown to students?
- No, university policy dictates that students do not see similarity reports except in a limited number of approved formative activities.
Which file types can Turnitin run a similarity report on?
- TurnItIn guidence online indicates that the system can take many file types, however our experience is that some of the “approved” file types do not always function/transfer well between Canvas and TurnItIn. The following file types have been tested and function properly in all tests. We recommend that for submissions that must go through TurnItIn, that you limit the accepted file types to these:
.docx, .pdf, .txt, .pptx, .rtf
How do I access the similarity report?
- Similarity reports are accessed via the Canvas SpeedGrader window, or alternatively, via the Gradebook. For full guidance, please see the guide below.
Accessing the Similarity Report with Canvas Plagiarism Framework
Can we de-anonymise a Canvas assignment in order to check a submission?
You can, however it comes with warnings. Once the names are revealed in Canvas, the names are also released in the Turnitin similarity report. while you can re-add the anonymisation in Canvas, that change does not effect TurnItIn.
If you need to check a particular students submission, it may be wise to talk to the eLearning Team, who may be able to help.
Can we see an overview of the similarity scores, or export a list of them?
No, similarity scores can only be viewed per individual assignment.
Why can’t I see a similarity score in SpeedGrader for the submissions in my Cadmus assignment?
Cadmus doesn’t have the ‘Turnitin Plagiarism Framework’ integration, so you will need to check the similarity scores in Cadmus. We have asked Cadmus if they can add this feature.
If a student submits their work to a draft assignment and a final assignment in the same course, will the paper match against itself?
No, Turnitin exclude ‘self-matches’ made by the same student in the same course by default.
However there are some very rare circumstances where the exclusion may be de-activated, this has only been observed when a staff member or a student gained access to the Similarity report and removed the exclusion manually.
Please note, it will match if it’s submitted by a different student (including a test student account) or to a different course (e.g. a Sandbox).
What do I do if I can’t see a similarity score?
First, if available, choose the resubmit to turnitin-plagiarism-framework-prod option within the SpeedGrader submission details tray.
If this is not available, or doesn’t generate a similarity score, please get in touch.
It is likely that if you are not seeing the score on a single paper in the submission that the student uploaded with an unapproved file type. You may wish to consider setting up future submissions with a file type restriction to only: .docx, .pdf, .txt, .pptx, .rtf
How do I exclude incorrect matches?
This can be achieved using filters and exclusions. For full guidance, please refer to the page below.
Managing filters and exclusions in the Similarity Report
Having reviewed a similarity report, we think that the similarity score should be higher/lower – what do we do?
Contact the team and we will investigate further.