Help Center: Submitting Papers as an Instructor within Blackboard

Only instructors and students can submit papers to classes in Turnitin. When an instructor submits a paper he or she can do so in the place of an enrolled student or in the name of a non-enrolled student. Instructors can use one of four submission methods; single file upload, multiple file upload, cut and pasteupload, or zip file upload.

If the instructor has a copy of the file and would like to submit for an individual student, he or she can use the single file upload method.

How to submit a single file as an instructor

A course name

1. Log into Blackboard and click on the course you would like to submit an assignment to

The Assignments link

2. Click on the Assignments link

The submit paper button

3. Click the view/complete link underneath the assignment you want to submit a to

The choose a paper submission method: pull down menu with file upload selected

4. Select "single file upload" from the "choose a paper submission method:" pull down menu

The author pulldown menu, lists student name and email

5. Select the e-mail address of the student you would like to submit for (if the student is not enrolled, select "non-enrolled student") from the author pulldown menu

The first name, last name and submission title

6. You will need to enter the author's first name, last name and the paper title for the submission in the appropriate fields if you have chosen a non-enrolled student as the author

The browse button

7. Click browse to find the file on your computer

The open button

8. Find the file on your computer and click open

The upload button

9. Click upload

The submit button to finalize the submission

10. Review the file and click "submit" to finalize the submission

If an instructor would like to submit multiple papers at once they can use the multiple file upload submission option. Multiple file upload is similar to attaching multiple files within an email, where an instructor can attach multiple files to an upload before submitting the papers.

How to use the multiple file upload submission method

A course name

1. Log into Blackboard and click on the course you would like to submit papers to

The Assignments link

2. Click on the Assignments link

The submit paper button

3. Click the view/complete link underneath the assignment you want to submit a paper to

The choose a paper submission method: pulldown menu with multiple file upload selected

4. Select "multiple file upload" from the "choose a paper submission method:" pull down menu

The browse button

5. Click browse to find the file on your computer

The author pull down menu to select the student name and email address for the author of the paper

6. Select the e-mail address of the student you would like to submit for from the student pulldown menu (if the student is not enrolled, select "non-enrolled student")

The first name, last name and submission title

7. You will need to enter the author's first name, last name and the paper title for the submission in the appropriate fields if you have chosen a non-enrolled student as the author

8. Repeat steps 5-7 for each paper you would like to submit using bulk upload

The attach button

9. After attaching all the papers you would like to submit you can view all the papers in the "File Submission Preview" list

The submit button

10. Click submit all to finalize the submission

If the instructor would like to submit only a section of text from a file, only has the file in an unaccepted file type or only has a hard copy of the paper he or she would like to submit, the instructor should use the cut and paste method of submission.

How to use the cut and paste method of submission as an instructor

A course name

1. Log into Blackboard and click on the course you would like to submit an assignment to

The Assignments link

2. Click on the Assignments link

The submit paper button

3. Click the view/complete link underneath the assignment you want to submit a to

The Submit a paper by pulldown menu with cut & paste selected

4. Select "cut & paste upload" from the "choose a paper submission method:" pull down menu

The author pull down menu to select the student name and email address for the author of the paper

5. Select the e-mail address of the student you would like to submit for (if the student is not enrolled, select "non-enrolled student")

The first name, last name and submission title

6. You will need to enter the author's first name, last name and the paper title for the submission in the appropriate fields if you have chosen a non-enrolled student as the author

The text box to paste the text that has been copied

7. Either select the text you would like to submit from the source file on your computer, or type the text you would like to submit in the large "cut and paste" field

The submit button

8. Click submit

If the instructor has all the files he or she would like to submit for students in a zip file, the instructor can use the zip file upload method.

How to upload a zip file

A course name

1. Log into Blackboard and click on the course you would like to submit an assignment to

The Assignments link

2. Click on the Assignments link

The submit paper button

3. Click the view/complete link underneath the assignment you want to submit a to

The Submit a paper by pulldown menu with zip file selected

4. Select "zip file upload" from the "choose a paper submission method:" pull down menu

The browse button

5. Click browse to find the file on your computer

The submit button

6. Click upload

The authors name and paper title fields

7. Review the list of files and enter the authors' names and paper titles

The submit button

8. Click submit

The submit button

9. Review the final list of files and click submit to finalize the submission

Additional Information

  • The file size may not exceed 20 MB. Files of larger size may be reduced in size by removal of non-text content. Files that are password protected, encrypted, hidden, system files, or read only files cannot be uploaded or submitted to Turnitin.
  • Text only files may not exceed 2 MB.
  • The zip file upload accepts up to 1000 files or 100MB of zipped information. A zip file to be uploaded may not exceed either limit. Zip files should be checked to ensure only usable file formats are included in the upload.
  • Turnitin will automatically exclude papers submitted to the class under the same author's name from the Originality Report for a paper. Please note the names must be identical for this feature to work (i.e. John Doe is not recognized as the same author as Jonathan Doe).
  • Turnitin currently accepts the following file types for submission: MS Word (.doc), WordPerfect (.wpd), PostScript (.eps), Portable Document Format (.pdf), HTML (.htm), Rich Text (.rtf) and Plain Text (.txt). All files submitted to Turnitin must be text based. Papers which have been scanned must be sent through Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software before they can be submitted to Turnitin.
  • The automatic exclusion mentioned above is based first on the author's e-mail address then on the author's name. This means even if the authors' of two papers in the class have the same name (i.e. John Doe and John Doe) the system will not exclude the papers from one another's Originality Reports if different e-mail addresses are used (i.e. JDoe@turnitin.com and non-enrolled student). The system will exclude the papers from one another's Originality Report if the same or no e-mail address is used and the names are identical.
  • For information on submitting through Quick Submit, please view our article on using Quick Submit.
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