My essay is flagged as AI...

3

Hey everyone! I have an issue that I'm pretty frightened about. I decided to apply to the UK as an international student and, naturally, wrote my UCAS essay by myself. When I pasted it in the respective section, I saw the warning about them verifying the contents of the essay to ensure it's the student's own work. So I decided to run it through some plagiarism and AI checkers online. I didn't have trouble with the plagiarism part, but multiple sources flagged my essay as 50-80% AI. A singular source identified it as entirely human-written..
I'm incredibly scared that this will negatively impact my admissions decision, even though (as mentioned above) the essay is my own work. Does anyone have any advice regarding this? Should I change the essay, or leave it as is?
Thanks in advance <3

Reply 1

Admit-One

Universities Forum Helper

21

If you wrote the essay yourself, then the results of a random AI checker are irrelevant. Don't stress about it.

Reply 2

Coventry University Student Ambassadors

Official Rep

18

Original post

by ssa.alastair

Hey everyone! I have an issue that I'm pretty frightened about. I decided to apply to the UK as an international student and, naturally, wrote my UCAS essay by myself. When I pasted it in the respective section, I saw the warning about them verifying the contents of the essay to ensure it's the student's own work. So I decided to run it through some plagiarism and AI checkers online. I didn't have trouble with the plagiarism part, but multiple sources flagged my essay as 50-80% AI. A singular source identified it as entirely human-written..
I'm incredibly scared that this will negatively impact my admissions decision, even though (as mentioned above) the essay is my own work. Does anyone have any advice regarding this? Should I change the essay, or leave it as is?
Thanks in advance <3

Hi,

Universities are well aware that AI detection tools can be unreliable and often flag legitimate work as AI-generated. If your UCAS essay is entirely your own work, there’s no need to panic. Admissions teams focus more on the authenticity and coherence of your application rather than relying solely on automated tools. My advice is to get a teacher of yours to review the personal statement to see if they can help better amend it.. If you’re still worried, you could add a brief note to your university choices explaining your concerns and reaffirming that the essay is your genuine work. Remember, universities value honesty and effort above all, so trust in the hard work you’ve put into your application!

Best wishes,
Sabba | Coventry University Student Ambassador | Law LLB

Reply 3

ambiguus

6

A lot of Ai checker tools that are accessible to the public and not used in school are there to sell you something. It ‘picks up’ on the AI and in return you’ll see an ad somewhere to buy a grammar checker etc so I wouldn’t worry

Reply 4

ConnieNeaves

5

Original post

by ssa.alastair

Hey everyone! I have an issue that I'm pretty frightened about. I decided to apply to the UK as an international student and, naturally, wrote my UCAS essay by myself. When I pasted it in the respective section, I saw the warning about them verifying the contents of the essay to ensure it's the student's own work. So I decided to run it through some plagiarism and AI checkers online. I didn't have trouble with the plagiarism part, but multiple sources flagged my essay as 50-80% AI. A singular source identified it as entirely human-written..
I'm incredibly scared that this will negatively impact my admissions decision, even though (as mentioned above) the essay is my own work. Does anyone have any advice regarding this? Should I change the essay, or leave it as is?
Thanks in advance <3

Hi!

I'm currently a second-year law student, and when I run my essays through AI checkers, it will always give me at least 35% AI. I know how daunting it can be to submit something important with the risk of it being flagged for AI.

I've found that repeating the same sentence structures in my work can flag it as AI content. This may be similar to what you are experiencing. So unless you want to rewrite the whole thing, I would not worry too much. Some of my university modules' learning materials even get flagged for AI!

AI checkers are not that accurate (even sites like Turnitin are awful, and all universities still use them!). Just knowing that you did write it yourself should give you enough peace of mind. Good luck with your application!

Reply 5

parkergryson32

1

Proven studies have showed that there are really no reliable AI plagiarism checking tools. Hence, some errors my develop and your work might be original but deemed typical to AI.

(edited 1 year ago)

Reply 6

SofiaDC

4

How is it possible that some AI's sound like humans and some humans sound like AI's (take me for example)?? Are the roles switching now? Are they going to dominate the world?!

Reply 7

hallamstudents

Official Rep

18

Original post

by ssa.alastair

Hey everyone! I have an issue that I'm pretty frightened about. I decided to apply to the UK as an international student and, naturally, wrote my UCAS essay by myself. When I pasted it in the respective section, I saw the warning about them verifying the contents of the essay to ensure it's the student's own work. So I decided to run it through some plagiarism and AI checkers online. I didn't have trouble with the plagiarism part, but multiple sources flagged my essay as 50-80% AI. A singular source identified it as entirely human-written..
I'm incredibly scared that this will negatively impact my admissions decision, even though (as mentioned above) the essay is my own work. Does anyone have any advice regarding this? Should I change the essay, or leave it as is?
Thanks in advance <3

Hi there,

If you have written the essay yourself, try not to worry about this as they are not always accurate! I know it can feel scary that it says it may have been written by AI, however if you know you have done it yourself, there is no need to worry about this.

If you can, maybe have someone have a look over it and see if there are any amendments you could make to make sure that you are happy that it is all original work and you are happy with the content.

Like people have said, these sites can be inaccurate and UCAS/the universities you are applying to will know this and will be able to take this into account.

I hope some of this helps,

Lucy -SHU student ambassador 🙂

Reply 8

astr0star123

15

Original post

by SofiaDC

How is it possible that some AI's sound like humans and some humans sound like AI's (take me for example)?? Are the roles switching now? Are they going to dominate the world?!

no lol..

Reply 9

ARU Graduate

Official Rep

7

Original post

by ssa.alastair

Hey everyone! I have an issue that I'm pretty frightened about. I decided to apply to the UK as an international student and, naturally, wrote my UCAS essay by myself. When I pasted it in the respective section, I saw the warning about them verifying the contents of the essay to ensure it's the student's own work. So I decided to run it through some plagiarism and AI checkers online. I didn't have trouble with the plagiarism part, but multiple sources flagged my essay as 50-80% AI. A singular source identified it as entirely human-written..
I'm incredibly scared that this will negatively impact my admissions decision, even though (as mentioned above) the essay is my own work. Does anyone have any advice regarding this? Should I change the essay, or leave it as is?
Thanks in advance <3

Hiya,

As others have advised, if this is entirely your own work then I wouldn’t worry about it! Just submit it and forget about it.

I’ve heard from other students that have made this mistake with their own essays and caused themselves a lot of unnecessary stress! Avoid these checkers and AI altogether and you should have nothing to worry about.

Good luck with your application 🙂

Sophie

My essay is flagged as AI...

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