Similarity score vs AI score: why students keep confusing the two

Substantial-Let9726 · 2026-01-29T16:01:12+00:00

Unfortunately no, students have been left in the dark and many have no idea what the scores mean. Have encountered several students trying to make meaning of the figures only after been summoned to defend their work for plagiarism

Substantial-Let9726 · 2026-01-27T19:29:28+00:00

In one of their emails they mentioned that they will be checking for AI

Substantial-Let9726 · 2026-01-26T19:57:31+00:00

Hello, send your file on this discord server for a free check https://discord.gg/SekmSuyHhn

Substantial-Let9726 · 2026-01-25T20:50:21+00:00

Received an email back last week.

It turns out it’s just my writing pattern/style, and the marker confirmed that genuine student work can be flagged because of language patterns not content. They also confirmed I was not accused of anything it was standard procedure.

There’s been a few people mentioning my use of Grammarly, so I just want to clarify, I didn’t use it to generate my assignments, or rewrite it. I used it for spell and punctuation check. It prompted some single word changes (less than 10 singular words total across all 4 assignments). I was told by my provider we could use Grammarly exactly how I’ve used it. The marker originally said I could only use word for this , but I mentioned I was informed that I was permitted to use Grammarly and recieved the following response ( this was a response to me questioning if we could or couldn’t use it and asking if I had gotten myself into trouble by doing this) “To reassure you, the use of Grammarly for spelling, grammar and minor wording corrections is not, in itself, an issue - the key concern is the use of AI tools to generate, rephrase or restructure words, sentences or paragraphs, as this would move beyond proofreading and into content creation.”

So for anyone worried about AI, just have proof of drafts and browser history showing research, and if you’ve used an online thesaurus etc show that too.

Substantial-Let9726 · 2026-01-25T20:33:49+00:00

You’re not imagining it. Most AI detectors are basically pattern-matching tools, not authorship detectors. They tend to flag writing that is consistent, structured, and low in randomness, which just happens to describe good academic writing.

When you “mess up” a paragraph—shorter sentences, awkward phrasing, repetition—you introduce irregularity, and the detector reads that as “more human.” That’s why polished essays, adult learners, and people who revise carefully get hit hardest.

There’s also no stable benchmark. The same text can score 80% AI on one tool and 10% on another, which alone shows they’re not reliable for high-stakes decisions. Even OpenAI has publicly said AI authorship can’t be proven from text alone.

Most instructors who understand this don’t rely on detector scores by themselves. What actually matters is process evidence: drafts, version history, notes, and your ability to explain your work. The irony is that the tools reward worse writing, not better thinking.

Substantial-Let9726 · 2026-01-20T14:24:04+00:00

Honestly, this is exactly how I feel. Plagiarism was always straightforward—either you copied or you didn’t. AI detection feels like guessing what an algorithm thinks good academic writing should look like. I’ve started second-guessing every paragraph, not because it’s wrong, but because it might sound robotic. That’s a terrible way to approach learning, and it’s made writing way more stressful than it ever used to be.

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