HEC gets extension for plagiarism prevention service

By Our Staff Reporter

ISLAMABAD - The Higher Education Commission has got one-year extension for the Plagiarism Prevention Service (Turnitin) for around 115 universities and degree awarding institutions in Pakistan. 

The service was initially given in 2009 to 60 public sector universities for checking thesis, papers and assignments of the students at post-graduate and under-graduate levels. The service is part of the Pakistan Education Research Network (PERN) and is accessible through internet. Both public and private sector universities are using this service for developing quality research culture.

As per usage details of 2014-15, the universities in Pakistan have uploaded 546,615 documents for checking originality of the content and out of that 280,571 were without un-original work. Around 10,000 assignments were graded through Grade Mark component, which provide transparent online assessment system. Although, Higher Education Commission is regularly organising trainings for focal persons in the universities as well as for individual faculty members. It is also providing online support for the faculty members who can use share screen option for immediate resolution of their issues.

Turnitin comprises three main components i.e. originality check, peer mark, and grade mark. The main objective of this service is to provide complete support system to the faculty members and students for developing writing skills.

The faculty members are required to guide students about proper referencing and critically analyzing work of peers. The grade mark further provides opportunity to have direct interaction with the faculty member for improving and enhancing the content. The service is being used by more than 15,000 institutions in more than 130 Countries. The institutions include universities, colleges and school in some cases. It is a user friendly and supports English, Arabic and other 10 languages in full-fledged manner.