Hi everyone,
We had a HS assignment where we wrote our college essays and submitted them to Turnitin for the teacher to grade. I really liked my essay, so I’m using the exact copy that I submitted for my college applications. However, will this be a concern, as Turnitin stores old essays so any admissions offices that use plagiarism checkers, specifically Turnitin, will see that my essay is “plagiarized?”
Thanks!
In the unlikely event that a college checks 40K essays against Turnitin, it would come back to your own essay. It’s a non-event.
The thing is, my common app is under a different email, so it wouldn’t come back to me since I submitted my essay through a school account.
If it turns up as plagiarized, the college will get a link to send an email asking about it to the original teacher to whom you submitted the paper. Then that teacher just has to write back and say that it’s yours and not plagiarized. If the college ever uses turnitin (and I don’t know whether they do or not), then I would guess the teacher has encountered this situation many times before. Don’t worry about it.
Let’s do the math. A teacher has ~100 students. An LAC will get 8-10K applications. A top tier private university will get 40 K applications. A top public will get 65K applications.
What’s manageable for Mrs Smith at East Podunk High is not happening in the UMich admissions office. There are plenty of stressors in the application process; this is not one of them. That said, just don’t turn in a plagiarized essay. Just because a college does not use Turnitin does not mean that it can’t be discovered later on.