Hi Turnitin Team,

I would like to suggest an improvement to the Similarity Report.

My university require students to use a standard cover page, declaration, table of contents, page numbering, and reference list. However, these mandatory sections have been automatically included in the Similarity Index, making the overall % appear unreasonable high than the originality of the actual assignment. During upload, I don't have the option to exclude the cover page, contents page, page numbers & bibliography. As a result, all these contributed to high and unreasonable similarity score.

This can be misleading because some lecturers judge a submission based on the overall similarity % before acceptance or reviewing the detailed report. As a result, students may receive an unfair first impression even when their academic writing is original.

Could Turnitin consider automatically excluding or separately reporting (instead of by filtering after generating the overall score):

1) University cover pages and declaration forms

2) Page numbers, headers, and footers

3) Tables of contents

4) Reference/Bibliography sections

Alternatively, it would be helpful to display an Net Content Similarity Score only that excludes these administrative and formatting elements.

I fully support Turnitin's role in promoting academic integrity. My suggestion is simply to ensure that the Similarity Index reflects the originality of the student's actual academic work rather than mandatory formatting.

Thank you for considering this suggestion & hopefully it can be resolved in soonest.