How Turnitin Draft Coach can improve your grades ?

At Nexford, we know that every assignment you submit is a chance to showcase your knowledge, critical thinking, and communication skills. However, even the most well-researched assignment can lose points due to grammar mistakes, improper citations, or unintentional plagiarism due to a high similarity score.

That’s where Turnitin Draft Coach comes in — a powerful writing assistant now available to all learners using Word Online.

How it works?

Using Draft Coach is easy. Just visit www.office.com,  login with your NXU account, then open Word Online, and the Turnitin add-in will appear automatically. Click on the draft coach icon and authenticate your NXU Microsoft account. From there, you can begin drafting and checking your work before submitting.

For more details about the tool installation guide, please see this article: Adding Draft Coach to Microsoft Word Online – Turnitin Guides

And for a video tutorial, please watch the video:

If you are having issues with Turnitin appearing automatically, please do the following:

-Click the Home tab
-Click Add-ins [the red box icon at the right, next to 'Editor'
-Type in the search 'Draft Coach' or 'Turnitin'
-Select Draft Coach and click 'Add'

The Turnitin tab should now be added to your ribbon after you accept the permissions, as in the video tutorial

Assess your assignment before submitting it.

Before you submit your assignment to the intended submission portal in Canvas, Draft Coach allows you to run a similarity and other checks against the same engine used in the official submission portal. This means you can catch high similarity scores early and revise your work to ensure it’s original and properly cited, helping you avoid unnecessary resubmission requests or academic similarity grading issues.

What Is a Similarity Score, and Why Does It Matter? 

Your similarity score reflects how much of your work matches existing sources across the internet, publications, and previously submitted assignments. A high score could mean that parts of your work are too close to someone else’s, even if that wasn’t your intention.

This can:

• Impact your grading

• Impact your academic standing

But more importantly, it can prevent you from mastering the writing and research skills expected in your program.

How Draft Coach Helps You Avoid High Similarity Scores?

Turnitin Draft Coach is now available for use in Word Online, and it’s your first line of defense against high similarity. With up to three similarity checks per document, you can:

• Identify which parts of your writing may be too similar to external sources.

• Learn how to rephrase or properly cite your content.

• Make corrections before officially submitting your assignment.

And that’s not all. Draft Coach also gives you unlimited attempts to:

•  Citation Checks – to ensure all your sources are properly credited.

•  Grammar Checks – to improve sentence structure and writing clarity.

Note: You have only three attempts for each document to run the similarity check on its content, while you have unlimited attempts for both the citation check and grammar check.

Should you have any further questions or need assistance, please send your question to the Learner Success team here: Ask A Question.