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How to Invest Safely
When you want to invest, it can be tricky to know where to start, especially if you’d prefer to avoid higher risk stocks and markets that make the news every day. Read on to learn more about safe investment opportunities that can help you grow your wealth.
Savings Accounts
Savings accounts are simple to invest in and are one of the lowest-risk investment options you’ll find. A savings account grows by accruing interest over time. Usually, the interest rates for a savings account are low, but they’re higher than what you’d get from keeping your money in a regular checking account. You can open a savings account with your financial institution and withdraw funds at any point.
Certificates of Deposit (CDs)
Certificates of Deposit (CDs) are bank-issued savings certificates that offer a higher interest rate than the traditional savings account. Unlike with a savings account, money that you invest in a CD is time-locked for a certain time frame, which means that you won’t have access to it for a period of months or years after your initial investment. However, CDs are considered low-risk since they lock you into an interest rate at the beginning of the period. Even if interest rates fall during your investment period, you’ll be locked into the higher rate and collect on that at maturity.
Government Securities
Government securities represent investments where you purchase a security — usually a bond — from the government. You can invest in government bonds at the local, state or federal level, depending on where you live. Government bonds are considered safe since they are backed by the government itself. In general, government securities carry a very low interest rate and are time-locked, which means you can’t access your funds during the bond period but receive a small increase when you cash in at the end.
Annuities are contracts that you make with insurance companies to give them a certain amount as your investment in return for a guaranteed — typically higher — return later on. The main attraction of an annuity is that it guarantees a certain return at the end. The downside of an annuity is that your money is locked in for a certain period of time during which you can’t access your funds.
Dividend-Paying Stocks
If you’re looking for a stock market investment that’s lower risk, you may want to consider dividend-paying stocks. These are stocks in companies that pay dividends on a regular basis, which means you’ll get regular returns from your investment. You want to look for stocks that have growing dividend payouts since this should indicate a continued ability to pay over the period of your investment.
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What is SafeAssign?
For more information, see:
- SafeAssign On-Demand video (Blackboard 3 minutes)
- SafeAssign for Instructors
- SafeAssign for Students
- Creating SafeAssignments
Copying or Moving SafeAssignments to another course
Why doesn't my SafeAssignment work after a course copy? After performing a course copy or moving an individual SafeAssignment to another course, instructors must sometimes perform an additional step to activate the SafeAssignment in the new course.
- In the Control Panel , select Course Tools.
- Click SafeAssign .
- On the SafeAssign screen, click SafeAssignments .
- On the SafeAssignments screen, click the Synchronize this Course button on the far right. This will establish the link between the SafeAssignment and the Central SafeAssign server
- You will see a notice, "Please wait. This course is being synchronized with SafeAssign. The page will load as soon as the synchronization is over."
- You will be brought back to the SafeAssignments screen.
The synchronize function deals with breaks in communication or has been copied. Don't be afraid to to periodically click the Synch button if any course level issues arise. By synchronizing, you can ensure the correct associations exist between the course and the SafeAssign central database.
Additional Information
See these helpful websites for "how to" information:
- Purdue University: Blackboard SafeAssign Instructor Guide - Instructions for Creating and Managing Assignments using SafeAssign Plagiarism Detection
- Grand Rapids Community College: Blackboard 9 - SafeAssignment
- Cape Fear Community College: Safe Assign in Blackboard 9
- Safe Assign Part 1: Activating SafeAssign (Bb 9.1)
- Safe Assign Part 2: Creating a Safe Assignment (Bb 9.1)
- Safe Assign Part 3: Submitting a Safe Assignment (Bb 9.1)
- Safe Assign Part 4: Interpreting a Safe Assignment (Bb 9.1)
Blackboard SafeAssign: A Plagiarism Prevention Tool
Empower student success with a powerful and effective tool for promoting academic integrity and evaluating originality.
SafeAssign compares submitted assignments against a set of academic papers to identify areas of overlap between the submitted assignment and existing works. SafeAssign originality reports provide detailed information about the matches found between a student’s submitted paper and existing sources. Both instructors and students can use the report to review assignment submissions for originality and create opportunities to identify how to properly attribute sources.
Easy to Use
Best in class user experience with exactly the information you need in a clean, understandable interface designed to minimize clutter.
Integrated Workflows
By integrating with your LMS rather than adding yet another external tool to work with, SafeAssign provides a seamless experience.
Robust Content Sources
User submissions are compared with content from other students at their own school, from other schools, from academic and business journals, and from the broader Internet.
Inline Match Comparison
Text matches are easily compared to the source content directly within the interface, and teachers can omit sources temporarily or permanently with ease.
Teachable Moments
Teachers can choose to allow students to see the results of Originality Reports, providing learning opportunities for understanding how to write and express themselves.
Learn More About How SafeAssign Integrates with Moodle
More resources.
Interpreting a SafeAssign Score
Download this instructor guide to interpreting the scores.
Check out the SafeAssign FAQ documentation on our help pages.
Let's Connect to Talk About How SafeAssign Can Help with Your Plagiarism Prevention Needs
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Submit with SafeAssign
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention tool that allows your instructor to check the originality of a homework submission. SafeAssign automatically conducts the check by comparing your assignment against a database of other assignment submissions.
Submit an assignment using SafeAssign in Blackboard Learn: Original Course View
Doesn't seem familiar? Jump to the "Ultra" help about submitting an assessment using SafeAssign .
SafeAssign can only process files smaller than 10MB. If your submission is larger than 10MB, SafeAssign won't be able to process it.
If your instructor hasn't allowed multiple attempts, you may submit your assignment only once. Before you select Submit , be sure that you have attached any required files.
- Access the assignment. On the Upload Assignment page, review the instructions, due date, points possible, and download any files provided by your instructor. A message appears to let you know that your submission will be processed by SafeAssign.
- Select Write Submission to expand the area where you can type your submission.
Drag files from your computer to the "hot spot" in the Attach Files area. If your browser allows, you can also drag a folder of files. The files will upload individually. If the browser doesn't allow you to submit your assignment after you upload a folder, select Do not attach in the folder's row to remove it. You can drag the files individually and submit again.
You can use the file name or provide another name for the file.
- Optionally, type Comments about your submission.
- Select Submit .
After you submit an assignment using SafeAssign, a slight delay occurs between the upload and the availability of the Originality Report. Results are normally available within 10-15 minutes.
View SafeAssign submissions
View your submission and the SafeAssign reports associated with it by accessing the assignment after you submit your paper.
This option is available only if allowed by your instructor.
- Return to the assignment you submitted previously.
- Under Assignment Details , select SafeAssign .
- View the overall match percentage that SafeAssign detected. If you have multiple attachments, SafeAssign analyzes each attachment.
- If your instructor allowed multiple attempts, select other attempts to view SafeAssign's analysis for that content.
- To learn more, select View Originality Report for an attempt.
More on the Originality Report
Submit an assignment or test using SafeAssign in Blackboard Learn: Ultra Course View
Doesn't seem familiar? Jump to the "Original" help about submitting an assignment using SafeAssign .
Your instructor is using SafeAssign if you see Originality Report enabled in the Details & Information of your assignment or test.
Assignments and tests using SafeAssign in the Ultra Course View don't require you to take any extra steps when you're ready to submit your work. SafeAssign automatically checks your work, including attachments and text responses, for matches to published materials.
When you open an assignment, you're informed if your submission is set to be graded anonymously.
More on anonymous grading
SafeAssign starts processing your assignment or test as soon as you hit Submit . While the service analyzes your work, Originality Report in progress appears on the panel. SafeAssign creates an Originality Report for each part of your assignment or test, including text questions and attachments.
Your instructor decides whether you can see Originality Reports for your assignment attempt.
You can view the Originality Report before your instructor grades your attempt. Open the Details & Information panel and select View Originality Report . If your instructor allowed multiple attempts, SafeAssign analyzes all of your attempts separately. You can find the Originality Report for each attempt on the Submission panel.
If allowed by your instructor, the Originality Report appears side-by-side with your attempt. The top of the Originality Report displays the overall text matching that SafeAssign detected. Select an entry under Originality Report to view the full report.
More on how to read the Originality Report
Creating a submission means you agree to the terms and conditions listed above the File submissions area. We provide a link to both the Blackboard Terms and Service and Blackboard Privacy Policy . We recommend reading through those two policies before submitting your assignment.
Exclude submissions from the Institutional and Global References Databases
If the check box " Exclude submissions from the Institutional and Global References Databases " is checked, the submission is not stored in the Institutional and Global databases. The submission is stored as a draft in our internal DB for technical purposes. Drafts have the ability to get the Originality report to understand the matching score, however, no other submission can be matched against this draft.
- Submissions A, B and C are the same documents.
- Submission A, included in DBs, is submitted and OR is generated.
- Submission B, excluded from DBs, is submitted and OR is generated, referencing found match in Submission A.
- Submission C, included in DBs, is submitted, and OR is generated, referencing found match in
- Submission A, however, the OR will not see Submission B as a possible matching source.
Learn - student
Need more help with safeassign.
- Contact your institution's support desk
- Watch videos for students
- Find more help
- Teaching and Learning with Blackboard
- Assessment Tools
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention tool that detects unoriginal content in students' papers by identifying areas of overlap between submitted assignments and existing works. SafeAssign can also be used to help students identify how to properly attribute sources rather than paraphrase without giving credit to the original source. The SafeAssign feature is effective as both a deterrent and an educational tool.
Note: Delays in SafeAssign occur throughout the semester based on high demand. Please DO NOT have students resubmit papers as this pushes them to the back of the queue. Blackboard currently reports as much as 24-36 hours or more may elapse before report results are returned.
How SafeAssign Works
Enabling safeassign.
- SafeAssign Assessment Reports
Interpreting SafeAssign Scores
The SafeAssign feature is based on a unique text matching algorithm capable of detecting both exact and inexact matches between a submitted paper and a particular source material. Assignments submitted to the SafeAssign database are compared with several different databases, including the following:
- Internet: Comprehensive index of documents available for public access on the Internet
- ProQuest ABI/Inform database: More than 1,100 publication titles and about 2.6 million articles from 1990's to present time, updated weekly (exclusive access)
- Institutional document archives: Contains all papers submitted to SafeAssign by users in their respective institutions
- Global Reference Database: Contains papers that were volunteered by students from Blackboard client institutions to help prevent cross-institutional plagiarism
Assignments accept every possible file type as an attachment to a submission. SafeAssign will only process and create Originality Reports for attachments with compatible file types. SafeAssign is only able to support file types that are convertible to plain text including the following file types: .docx; .doc; .pdf; .txt; .odt; .rtf; .html; .htm; and .zip (processing files that match any of these file types within the .zip). However, Learn Assignment's Inline Grading feature only supports the following subset of file types: .pptx; .ppt; .xlsx; .xls; .docx; .doc; and .pdf. SafeAssign will only process and create Originality Reports for attachments that match the above file types. For unsupported file types, the SafeAssign Originality Report will omit a matching score. This information is visible in the right-hand navigation bar of the new Originality Report.
These two lists of compatible file types mean that there are only certain file types that can be displayed in the Inline Grading workflow and processed by SafeAssign. Below is a Venn diagram outlining which file types support both features:
- Original Course View
- Ultra Course View
- Tutorials and Guides
Enabling SafeAssign in Original Course View
Enable the SafeAssign tool during Assignment creation and editing, under the Submission Details section.
Faculty have the option to Exclude Submissions when creating an Assignment. This option will allow faculty to create Assignments that do not include any student submissions in the Institutional or Global Reference Databases, enabling students to "check their work" against SafeAssign sources prior to submitting a final version without subsequently revised drafts being flagged as matching the previous "draft" submissions. Like other options on Assignments, this option will be point-in-time and editable after assignment creation. If the option were changed at a later date, new submissions would honor the new state of the setting.
Enabling SafeAssign in Ultra Course View
Enable SafeAssign in the settings panel while creating an Assignment or a Test.
- Open Assignment Settings or Test Settings in a new or existing assessment.
- Under SafeAssign , select Enable Originality Report .
- When you enable SafeAssign for the assessment, you can also allow students to view the Originality Report. If you allow multiple attempts, an Originality Report is generated for each attempt a student submits.
- Choose whether to exclude submissions from the institutional and Global Reference Databases.
- Close the layer. Your changes are saved!
You can enable the SafeAssign Originality Report at any time, even after students have started their submissions, but submissions are only checked when SafeAssign is enabled. Submissions received before you enable the setting aren't checked with SafeAssign.
SafeAssign Doesn't Generate a Report when Filename Has Special Characters
Please note that assignment submissions with special characters (i.e., #,:,*,space, etc.) are not evaluated by SafeAssign and will not generate a report.
It is recommended that users only include numbers, letters, hyphens, and underscores in their filenames. In cases where student users have already made a submission, change the assignment setting to allow multiple submissions and then ask them to resubmit the document after making the appropriate filename change.
- SafeAssign Originality Reports
After a paper has been processed, an Originality Report will be available that will show the percentage of text in the submitted paper that matches existing sources. It also shows the suspected sources of each section of the submitted paper that returns a match. The faculty can then delete matching sources from the report and process it again. This procedure is useful to ascertain if the paper is a continuation of a previously submitted work by the same student.
Because the SafeAssign feature identifies all matching blocks of text, it is important that the faculty reads the report carefully and determines whether or not the block of text in question is properly attributed.
Click here for more details about the Originality Report
The sentence matching scores represent the percentage probability that two phrases have the same meaning. This number can also be interpreted as the reciprocal to the probability that these two phrases are similar by chance. For example, a score of 90 percent means that there is a 90 percent probability that these two phrases are the same and a 10 percent probability that they are similar by chance and not because the submitted paper includes content from the existing source (whether or not it is appropriately attributed).
The overall score is an indicator of what percentage of the submitted paper matches existing sources. Please note that this score is a warning indicator only and it is the faculty’s responsibility to review the papers carefully to see if the matches are properly attributed.
- Scores below 15 percent: These papers typically include some quotes and few common phrases or blocks of text that match other documents. These papers typically do not require further analysis, as there is no evidence of the possibility of plagiarism in these papers.
- Scores between 15 percent and 40 percent: These papers include extensive quoted or paraphrased material or they may include plagiarism. These papers should be reviewed to determine if the matching content is properly attributed.
- Scores over 40 percent: There is a very high probability that text in this paper was copied from other sources. These papers include quoted or paraphrased text in excess and should be reviewed for plagiarism.
Frequently Asked Questions
SafeAssign can be used in two ways.
- Faculty Members can set up SafeAssignments in their courses on Blackboard and let students submit papers to complete these assignments, in a way very similar to the Assignmnent tool provided by Blackboard Learning System. The papers will then be delivered to Faculty Members through the Blackboard Learning System together with the SafeAssign Originality Reports, which details the results of the matching process.
- Faculty Members may upload papers directly, without student involvement through the Direct Submit feature.
What information does SafeAssign provide in its reports? A SafeAssign Originality Report highlights any blocks of text in submitted documents that match reference sources, and links back to the matching documents on the Internet or in supported content databases. SafeAssign reports also show similarity ratings for each matching sentence and allow Faculty Members to view a line-by-line comparison of potentially unoriginal text from submitted papers and the matching external documents.
If intructors enable student viewing, each student can view the reports for their own submitted papers.
SafeAssign currently checks all submitted papers against the following databases:
- Internet - comprehensive index of billions of documents available for public access on the Internet;
- ProQuest ABI/Inform database with over 1,100 publication titles and about 2.6 million articles from '90s to present time, updated weekly (exclusive access);
- Institutional document archives containing all papers submitted to SafeAssign by users in their respective institutions;
- Global Reference Database containing papers that were volunteered by students from Blackboard client institutions to help prevent cross-institutional plagiarism.
What is the Institutional Database? The Institutional Database is the archive of papers submitted by students in your institution. Each institution's Institutional Database is stored in the central SafeAssign service and kept separate from other institution's databases. Papers are automatically added to this database upon submission and are stored in the central service to be checked against other papers submitted from your institution. The Institutional Database is completely separate from the Global Reference Database which extends across institutions and students must volunteer their papers to.
Can SafeAssign process papers written in languages other than English? SafeAssign can generate originality reports for papers written in all alphabet-based languages with left-to-right writing. The user interface is currently only available in English.
Who owns the intellectual property rights for each submitted paper? Blackboard does not claim any ownership rights on the content submitted to SafeAssign.
How long does it take to generate originality reports? Reports are not generated instantaneously - it usually takes from several seconds to few minutes to receive a report. During peak use (such as the end of the semester), it can sometimes take several hours.
What file formats does SafeAssign support? SafeAssign supports Word (.doc or .docx), plain text (.txt), rich text format (.rtf), .pdf, and .html formats. In addition, supported file types can be compressed to a .zip file for Direct Submit.
What is the file size limit for files submitted to SafeAssign? There is a 10 MB limit on all files submitted to SafeAssign. This applies to individual student uploads to Assignments with SafeAssign enabled as well as .zip files of multiple papers uploaded by faculty using the Direct Submit feature (in which case the .zip file must be under 10 MB). Unfortunately, this limit is set by the SafeAssign servers, which are managed by Blackboard, so it cannot be overridden.
How does the Global Reference Database work? Blackboard's Global Reference Database is a separate database where students voluntarily donate copies of their papers to help prevent plagiarism. It is separated from each institution's internal database, where all papers are stored by each corresponding institution, and students are free to select the option to check their papers without submitting them to the Global Reference Database.
What if a student decides to remove a paper from the Global Reference Database? Students submit their papers to the database voluntarily and agree not to remove papers in the future.
Are students forced to submit papers to the Global Reference Database either by Blackboard or NIU? All papers are submitted to the Global Reference Database voluntarily, and students are free to choose not to submit their papers to this database. Faculty Members can still use the service effectively, even when students choose not to submit their papers to the Global Reference Database.
What is the SafeAssign "Synchronize this Course" option that appears in the "Direct Submit" area? The synchronize function is to deal with breaks in communication or to update a course which is based on a template or has been copied. It is a good idea for the faculty member to click on this when first using SafeAssign and to periodically update it or update if any course level issues arise. It simply synchronizes the papers in the course with the SafeAssign central database, ensuring the correct associations exist between the course and our central database.
Can students directly submit a draft assignment to check without having it deployed as a SafeAssignment via the instructor or having it be tied to the Grade Center in Blackboard? There is the option to make an assignment a draft. In this case, as mentioned above, the paper is not checked into the institutional database.
Why did SafeAssignment scores in the Grade Center get deleted after the students submitted their assignments? Make sure to enter SafeAssignment scores in the Grade Center after the students submit their assignments. Scores assigned prior to SafeAssignment submission are deleted when students submit their assignments. If paper assignments are collected together with a Blackboard SafeAssign feature, make sure to enter student grades after they have submitted their assignments electronically through SafeAssign.
It is possible to download all of the files that the students submitted to a SafeAssignment. This does not include the originality reports. Those must be viewed within Blackboard directly.
To download all of the submitted files:
- From the course with the SafeAssignment, open Course Tools in the Control Panel
- Click SafeAssign
- On the next page, choose SafeAssignments
- Move your mouse cursor over the SafeAssignment you are interested in. When the Action Link appears, click it and choose View Submissions from the menu
- Click the Download All Submissions button at the top of the page
Your browser will download a .zip folder that has all of the submissions. You can open the folder or extract the files to read the individual submissions.
If you get this error and you are logged into Blackboard, it means that the security or privacy settings of your web browser are set to not allow 3rd-party cookies. You will need to change that setting to be able to use SafeAssign.
For Internet Explorer:
- Click Tools
- Click Internet Options
- Click Privacy
- Set the setting to Low
For Firefox:
- Click Options
- Select Accept cookies from site
- Select Accept third-party cookies
- Change Keep until to they expire
For Safari:
- Click Safari
- Click Preferences
- Click Security
- Change Accept cookies to Always
If you or your students receive this error, you will need to re-synchronize your course. To do so:
- Underneath the Control Panel , expand the Course Tools menu.
- Click SafeAssign .
- On the following page, click SafeAssign Items .
- On the SafeAssign Items page, click the Synchronize this course button.
- You may briefly see a message telling you it will take a moment to synchronize. Your student(s) should now be able to access the Assignment.
- How to Use SafeAssign in Assignments Original
- How to Use SafeAssign in Assignments Ultra
Quick Guides
- Using SafeAssign in Assignments
- SafeAssign Originality Report
- Using DirectSubmit Original
- Grading with SafeAssign
See Also...
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- Performance Dashboard
- Progress Tracking
- Retention Center
- Self and Peer Assessment
- Tests and Quizzes
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SafeAssign FAQ
What is safeassign.
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention service, offered by Blackboard. This service helps educators prevent plagiarism by detecting unoriginal content in student papers. In addition to acting as a plagiarism deterrent, it also has features designed to aid in educating students about plagiarism and the importance of proper attribution of any borrowed content.
SafeAssign is a part of the Blackboard Beyond family and is centrally hosted by Blackboard, like the rest of the Beyond products and services. Although it is a new Blackboard service, it is based on a mature and proven technology that Blackboard acquired from Sciworth Inc. (MyDropBox) and enhanced to offer even better stability, performance, and integration with other Blackboard products. For more information, go to our SafeAssign page
How does the tool work?
SafeAssign can be used in two ways.
- Faculty Members can set up SafeAssignments in their courses on Blackboard and let students submit papers to complete these assignments, in a way very similar to the Assignmnent tool provided by Blackboard Learning System. The papers will then be delivered to Faculty Members through the Blackboard Learning System together with the SafeAssign Originality Reports, which details the results of the matching process.
- Faculty Members may upload papers directly, without student involvement through the Direct Submit feature.
What information does SafeAssign provide in its reports?
A SafeAssign Originality Report highlights any blocks of text in submitted documents that match reference sources, and links back to the matching documents on the Internet or in supported content databases. SafeAssign reports also show similarity ratings for each matching sentence and allow Faculty Members to view a line-by-line comparison of potentially unoriginal text from submitted papers and the matching external documents.
Can students view reports?
If intructors enable student viewing, each student can view the reports for their own submitted papers.
What databases does SafeAssign currently use for plagiarism checking?
SafeAssign currently checks all submitted papers against the following databases:
- Internet - comprehensive index of billions of documents available for public access on the Internet;
- ProQuest ABI/Inform database with over 1,100 publication titles and about 2.6 million articles from '90s to present time, updated weekly (exclusive access);
- Institutional document archives containing all papers submitted to SafeAssign by users in their respective institutions;
- Global Reference Database containing papers that were volunteered by students from Blackboard client institutions to help prevent cross-institutional plagiarism.
What is the Institutional Database?
The Institutional Database is the archive of papers submitted by students in your institution. Each institution's Institutional Database is stored in the central SafeAssign service and kept separate from other institution's databases. Papers are automatically added to this database upon submission and are stored in the central service to be checked against other papers submitted from your institution. The Institutional Database is completely separate from the Global Reference Database which extends across institutions and students must volunteer their papers to.
Can SafeAssign process papers written in languages other than English?
SafeAssign can generate originality reports for papers written in all alphabet-based languages with left-to-right writing. The user interface is currently only available in English.
Who owns the intellectual property rights for each submitted paper?
Blackboard does not claim any ownership rights on the content submitted to SafeAssign.
How long does it take to generate originality reports?
Reports are not generated instantaneously - it usually takes from several seconds to few minutes to receive a report. During peak use (such as the end of the semester), it can sometimes take several hours.
What file formats does SafeAssign support?
SafeAssign supports Word (.doc or .docx), plain text (.txt), rich text format (.rtf), .pdf, and .html formats. In addition, supported file types can be compressed to a .zip file for Direct Submit.
What is the file size limit for files submitted to SafeAssign?
There is a 10 MB limit on all files submitted to SafeAssign. This applies to individual student uploads to Assignments with SafeAssign enabled as well as .zip files of multiple papers uploaded by faculty using the Direct Submit feature (in which case the .zip file must be under 10 MB). Unfortunately, this limit is set by the SafeAssign servers, which are managed by Blackboard, so it cannot be overridden.
How does the Global Reference Database work?
Blackboard's Global Reference Database is a separate database where students voluntarily donate copies of their papers to help prevent plagiarism. It is separated from each institution's internal database, where all papers are stored by each corresponding institution, and students are free to select the option to check their papers without submitting them to the Global Reference Database.
What if a student decides to remove a paper from the Global Reference Database?
Students submit their papers to the database voluntarily and agree not to remove papers in the future.
Are students forced to submit papers to the Global Reference Database either by Blackboard or Schoolcraft?
All papers are submitted to the Global Reference Database voluntarily, and students are free to choose not to submit their papers to this database. Faculty Members can still use the service effectively, even when students choose not to submit their papers to the Global Reference Database.
What is the SafeAssign "Synchronize this Course" option that appears in the "Direct Submit" area?
The synchronize function is to deal with breaks in communication or to update a course which is based on a template or has been copied. It is a good idea for the faculty member to click on this when first using SafeAssign and to periodically update it or update if any course level issues arise. It simply synchronizes the papers in the course with the SafeAssign central database, ensuring the correct associations exist between the course and our central database.
Can students directly submit a draft assignment to check without having it deployed as a SafeAssignment via the instructor or having it be tied to the Grade Center in Blackboard?
There is the option to make an assignment a draft. In this case, as mentioned above, the paper is not checked into the institutional database.
Why did SafeAssignment scores in the Grade Center get deleted after the students submitted their assignments?
Make sure to enter SafeAssignment scores in the Grade Center after the students submit their assignments. Scores assigned prior to SafeAssignment submission are deleted when students submit their assignments. If paper assignments are collected together with a Blackboard SafeAssign feature, make sure to enter student grades after they have submitted their assignments electronically through SafeAssign.
How can I download all of the SafeAssign submissions at once?
It is possible to download all of the files that the students submitted to a SafeAssignment. This does not include the originality reports. Those must be viewed within Blackboard directly.
To download all of the submitted files:
- From the course with the SafeAssignment, open Course Tools in the Control Panel
- Click SafeAssign
- On the next page, choose SafeAssignments
- Move your mouse cursor over the SafeAssignment you are interested in. When the Action Link appears, click it and choose View Submissions from the menu
- Click the Download All Submissions button at the top of the page
Your browser will download a .zip folder that has all of the submissions. You can open the folder or extract the files to read the individual submissions.
Why do my students and I occasionally get an error message that we are not logged into SafeAssign?
If you get this error and you are logged into Blackboard, it means that the security or privacy settings of your web browser are set to not allow 3rd-party cookies. You will need to change that setting to be able to use SafeAssign.
For Internet Explorer:
- Click Tools
- Click Internet Options
- Click Privacy
- Set the setting to Low
For Firefox:
- Click Options
- Select Accept cookies from site
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A student tried to access or submit an Assignment with SafeAssign enabled, and received the error message "This course is out of sync with SafeAssign, please ask your instructor to re-sync your assignment." What should I do?
If you or your students receive this error, you will need to re-synchronize your course. To do so:
- Underneath the Control Panel , expand the Course Tools menu.
- Click SafeAssign .
- On the following page, click SafeAssign Items .
- On the SafeAssign Items page, click the Synchronize this course button.
- You may briefly see a message telling you it will take a moment to synchronize. Your student(s) should now be able to access the Assignment.
Most answers to FAQs provided by the SafeAssign Wiki: http://wiki.safeassign.com
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Center for the Advancement of Teaching Excellence
SafeAssign, Blackboard’s plagiarism prevention tool, compares submitted assignments against a set of academic papers to identify areas of overlap between the submitted assignment and existing works. Use SafeAssign to review assignment submissions for originality. SafeAssign is only available in Blackboard Learn course sites.
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- User icon Access Via Blackboard
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AVAILABLE TO: Faculty
FUNDING: University
Find Answers to Common Questions
- UIC Help Center
Other Resources
- Blackboard and SafeAssign FAQs
- Video: Using SafeAssign in Blackboard
Supported Files
The SafeAssign plagiarism detection service supports the following file formats:
- Microsoft Word documents i.e., files with .doc and .docx file name extensions
- Acrobat documents: .pdf
- HTML files: .htm and .html
- rich-text files: .rtf
- plain-text files: .txt
- open office documents: .odt
- zip files: .zip
Recommended practices
It is highly recommended that students and instructors name documents submitted to SafeAssign using only alphanumeric characters, the period, the underscore, and the hyphen, and one of the aforementioned file types; for example NetID.final.paper.doc or group2.assignment3.report.pdf.
In particular, using space/blank characters, quotation marks, diacritical marks, the pound sign, percent sign, and any other special characters should be avoided when naming documents for SafeAssign and for most any other Web-based/cloud computing application.
Accessibility
SafeAssign offers accessibility features that allows users to easily navigate and read the SafeAssign web interface. The web interface supports screen readers for all available creator and viewer interfaces. The web interface also support keyboard access, allowing you to use the tab key to access all available functions. All sessions fully support adding and displaying captions. For additional information on SafeAssign’s accessibility features, please visit SafeAssign’s Accessibility Conformance Report (WCAG Edition) .
Getting Started
Original view course.
- Go into the Original View course that you want to use SafeAssign in
- Select the assignment, and select Edit
- Scroll down to the Submission Details section, click on the title to open the accordion section
- Under Plagiarism Tools, check the box next to Check submissions for plagiarism using SafeAssign
- Allow students to view the SafeAssign Originality Report for their attempts
- Exclude submissions from the institutional and Global Reference Databases
- Select the Submit button to save the assignment settings.
For visual steps to follow, please download Detect Plagiarism with SafeAssign for your Original View course.
Ultra View Course
- Or go into the Ultra View course that you want to use SafeAssign in
- Select the assignment, open the Assignment Settings (gear icon)
- Scroll down to the Originality Report
- Toggle the Enable SafeAssign button
- Select the Save button twice to save the Originality Report settings and then the assignment settings.
Viewing the SafeAssign Report
In your Original View or Ultra View course, enter the gradebook
- Select the assignment you want to grade
- Once the assignment is open, you will be able to view the Originality Report on the right hand side of the screen.
Under construction
recorded webinars
"SafeAssign" is a plagiarism prevention service, offered by Blackboard to its Blackboard Learning System, Enterprise, Vista Enterprise, and CE Enterprise License clients. This service helps educators prevent plagiarism by detecting unoriginal content in student papers. In addition to acting as a plagiarism deterrent, it also has features designed to aid in educating students about plagiarism and the importance of proper attribution of any borrowed content.
General Information:
- SafeAssign Process
- Originality Reports
For Faculty
- SafeAssign in your Course
- Grade with SafeAssign
- Direct Submit
For Students
- Submit with SafeAssign and Review Results
SafeAssign Processing Time
The above link publishes Blackboard's most current SafeAssign status
- The average SafeAssign processing time is 2 hours.
- If there is a backlog or any additional delays, it can take up to 20 hours.
- Brightspace
- Google Apps
- Submit a Ticket
Division of Information Technology
Plagiarism protection - safeassign.
SafeAssign is software built into the Blackboard learning management system which checks several sources for potential plagiarism. SafeAssign helps instructors make informed decisions about reporting students for academic dishonesty.
Advantages of SafeAssign
Academic dishonesty at Stony Brook is a serious offense.
Students caught plagiarizing are sent to Academic Judiciary , where they will be penalized based on the severity of their offense.
One way faculty members can screen student work for plagiarism is by using SafeAssign.
What Can SafeAssign Do?
Blackboard's SafeAssign feature allows faculty to compare student papers to the following databases as a way to detect possible plagarized content.
- - Internet: Comprehensive index of documents available for public access on the internet.
- - ProQuest ABI/Inform database: More than 1,100 publication titles and about 2.6 million articles from 1990 to present time, updated weekly (exclusive access).
- - Institutional document archives: Contains all papers submitted to SafeAssign by users in their respective institutions.
- - Global Reference Database: Contains papers that were volunteered by students from Blackboard client institutions to help prevent cross-institution plagiarism.
Faculty members can set up assignments linked to the Grade Center for students to upload their work and upload individual documents to check for plagarism.
Getting Started with SafeAssign
How to use safeassign.
SafeAssign allows you to review assignment submissions for plagiarism and identify sections of improperly cited or paraphrased works to help students identify how to properly attribute.
Using SafeAssign
Originality Reports
SafeAssign Originality Reports allow you to easily see the results of the plagarism scan, with a list of potential sources and highlighted text.
Grading With SafeAssign
SafeAssign is fully integrated with the Blackboard Grade Center. Faculty can also use the inline grading feature to grade and annotate papers without downloading them.
Grading with SafeAssign
Direct Submit
Direct Submit allows instructors to upload a single paper to be plagarism checked.
Additional Information
There are no additional resources available for this service.
Getting Help
The Division of Information Technology provides support on all of our services. If you require assistance please submit a support ticket through the IT Service Management system.
Please Contact
Blackboard support team.
- [email protected]
- (631) 632-2358
- Administration
- Information Technology Services
- Instructional Technology Training and Development (ITTD)
Safe Assign
SafeAssign Help for Instructors
SafeAssign Help for Students
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SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention service, offered by Blackboard. This service helps educators prevent plagiarism by detecting unoriginal content in
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention tool that compares submitted assignments against a set of academic papers to identify areas of overlap.
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention tool that allows your instructor to check the originality of a homework submission. SafeAssign automatically conducts the
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention tool that detects unoriginal content in students' papers by identifying areas of overlap between submitted assignments
Like other options on Assignments, faculty can enable the SafeAssign service during Assignment creation and editing, under the Submission Details section.
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention service, offered by Blackboard. This service helps educators prevent plagiarism by detecting unoriginal content in
SafeAssign, Blackboard's plagiarism prevention tool, compares submitted assignments against a set of academic papers to identify areas of overlap between
"SafeAssign" is a plagiarism prevention service, offered by Blackboard to its Blackboard Learning System, Enterprise, Vista Enterprise, and CE Enterprise
SafeAssign is software built into the Blackboard learning management system which checks several sources for potential plagiarism.
SafeAssign is a plagiarism prevention service, offered by Blackboard. This service helps educators prevent plagiarism by detecting unoriginal content in
I am presenting a case study about a plagiarism case that we discovered via the SafeAssign tool. The discovery was used to intervene with