Student users of Turnitin submit papers to a class from the class portfolio page. The class portfolio page is viewed by clicking on the name of the class from the student homepage. The class portfolio page lists assignments created by the instructor for students to submit to.
Note: If there are no assignments listed, students will not be able to submit any papers to the course until the assignments are created. Ensure that the correct course is being accessed and contact the instructor if no assignments are available to submit to. Only the instructor controlling the class will be able to create assignments for students in the class.
File Types and Size
Turnitin currently accepts the following file types for upload into an assignment:
- Microsoft Word™ (DOC and DOCX)
- Corel WordPerfect®
- HTML
- Adobe PostScript®
- Plain text (TXT)
- Rich Text Format (RTF)
- Portable Document Format (PDF)
- Hangul (HWP)
The file size may not exceed 20MB. Files of larger size may be reduced in size by removal of non-text content or the instructor may be contacted to request multiple assignments to submit the document in sections.
Note: Text only files may not exceed 2 MB.
Note: PDF documents must contain text to be submitted. PDF files containing only images of text will be rejected during the upload attempt. To determine if a document contains actual text, copy and paste a section or all of the text into a plain-text editor such as Microsoft Notepad or Apple TextEdit. If no text is copied over, the selection is not actual text.
Tip: Users submitting scanned images of a document or an image saved as a PDF will need to use Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software to convert the image to a text document. Manual correction of the resulting document is highly recommended to fix any errors caused by the conversion software.
Note: Some document formats can contain multiple data types. This includes text, images, embedded information from another file, and formatting. Non-text information that is not saved directly within the document will not be included in a file upload. This includes references to a Microsoft Excel® spreadsheet included within a Microsoft Office Word document.
Note: Users whose files are saved in a file type that is not accepted by Turnitin will need to use a word processing program to save the file as one of the accepted types. Rich Text Format and Plain Text file types are nearly universally available in word processing software. Neither file type will support images or non-text data within the file. Plain text format does not support any formatting, and rich text format supports only limited formatting options.
Tip: When converting a file to a new file format, users should rename their file with a name other than that of the original file. This is suggested to prevent permanent loss of the original formatting or image content of a file due to it being overwritten.
How to Submit a Paper
To submit a paper to an assignment on Turnitin, the user must log in and upload a file to an existing assignment. Assignments on Turnitin cannot accept student submissions until the assignment start date and time has passed. Assignments may also reject submissions after the due date and time set by the instructor.
To check the start date and due date information, either click on the name of the assignment in the class portfolio page or view the start and due dates located under the assignment name. This action opens a pop-up window showing assignment preference information, including start and due dates/times as well as other assignment information or special instructions.
Note: After the submission has been completed on step 7 below, a digital receipt is displayed in your browser window. A copy is also sent via e-mail to the address for the user login. It is important to use a valid e-mail address to receive this copy of the digital receipt. Save the receipt and the paper ID it contains, as this is proof of a completed submission.
Single File Upload
The single file upload allows students to submit to the assignment by directly loading the file from their computer.
Warning: Make sure that the file type you are submitting can be accepted by Turnitin.
Note: Users whose files are saved in a file type that is not accepted by Turnitin will need to use a word processing program to save the file as one of the accepted types. Rich Text Format and Plain Text file types are nearly universally available in word processing software. Neither file type will support images or non-text data within the file. Plain text format does not support any formatting, and rich text format supports only limited formatting options.
Submitting a paper by single file upload:
- Start by clicking on the class name you would like to submit to after logging in to Turnitin
- Click on the Submit button to the right of the assignment name
- Select single file upload from the choose a paper submission method: pull down menu
- Click the Browse button and select the file to upload. Fill in the submission title field with the paper name
- Click upload to upload the file. A status bar will appear displaying the upload progress
- Review the preview panel. This is a text only version of the paper being uploaded. Confirm it is the correct version of the file to send
- Click the "submit" button
Warning: This step must be completed, or the submission is not finished. The paper will not be available to the student or the instructor
After the submission has been completed on step 7 a digital receipt is displayed on screen. A copy is also sent via e-mail to the address for the user login. Save the receipt and the paper ID it contains, as this is proof of a completed submission.
The digital receipt contains a unique paper ID number, the name of the user profile submitting, the paper title given by the submitting party, the assignment title, and the e-mail address for the user submitting, as well as the body text of the file submitted.
Cut and Paste Submissions
The cut and paste submission option allows users to submit information from non-supported word processors or file types, or to only submit specific parts or areas of a document that may need an Originality Report generated.
Please note that only text can be submitted via the cut and paste method - any graphics, graphs, images, and formatting are lost when pasting into the text submission box.
Submitting a paper by copy and paste:
- Start by clicking on the class name you would like to submit to after logging in to Turnitin
- Click on the "Submit" button to the right of the assignment name
- Select "cut & paste upload" from the "choose a paper submission method:"" pull down menu
- Fill in the submission title field and copy the text from the text document. This must be done from a word processor able to open the file you wish to submit content from. Do not manually type an entire paper in the copy/paste field, which could cause the user login to time-out, losing all the entered data
Tip: To cut and paste text, highlight the text of a paper in a word processing or text editing program and select copy from the edit menu. To transfer the text into your browser, place your mouse cursor in the text box of the submission page and select "paste" from your browser’s "edit" menu
- Click "submit" to complete the cut and paste submission of the text pasted into the content box
Resubmitting
Some assignments may allow students the ability to overwrite their previous submissions until the due date and time set for the assignment. This option can be set by the instructor on an assignment by assignment basis. If overwriting is not enabled, the instructor must manually delete a previous submission to allow the student user to submit a second file.
Note: Only a single file may be submitted by a student user to any Turnitin assignment. Any second or subsequent submission will overwrite the original file submission in this assignment. Multiple files cannot be uploaded to the same assignment by a student.
Tip: If there is more than one file that must be submitted to complete the directions given by an instructor, contact the instructor immediately. Additional assignments may be created, or the student users may need to combine multiple documents into a single file of an acceptable file type to be uploaded into Turnitin.
How to Resubmit to an Assignment
If resubmission by overwrite has been enabled or an instructor has deleted the student user’s first submission, resubmitting a paper is handled in an identical manner as a first time submission to an assignment. Follow the steps for a first time submission as listed in this handbook.
Note: Originality Reports for any resubmission that is made in an assignment that allows resubmissions will require an additional twenty four hour delay to generate.
This applies to all submissions past the first submission made by any student user in any assignment.
Viewing Submitted Files
After a submission has been completed it will be immediately available to view from the class portfolio page for the student or the assignment inbox of the instructor. Submissions made previously can be viewed in any active or expired class that the student is still enrolled in on Turnitin. Instructors may delete classes or unenroll students which prevents the student from viewing submissions that were made in the class.
Every paper that has been submitted can be viewed by clicking on the "View" button next to the assignment name. This will open a new window in a separate screen that displays the paper information in the heading at the top and the full text of the paper beneath.
Downloading Submitted Papers
Previously submitted papers can be downloaded by the student user. This allows a student user to download and save a copy of any submission in the class made by this user. The downloadable version of the file is in the original format of the submission, indicated by the file type name to the right of the file download icon. Some accounts allow the student to select either the PDF version or the original format version to download.
To download a file navigate to the portfolio page for the class the file was submitted to.
Copies of submitted papers are downloaded by clicking on the download icon to the right of the assignment name. Some users may be prompted by pop-up windows or toolbar icons on their web browser to continue and approve the download or open the file.
