UC Santa Cruz.
- Detection status
- No AI-text or plagiarism detector confirmed by name anywhere on ucsc.edu across a named-vendor and category sweep; the campus's own generative-AI FAQ states student work should not be submitted to external, web-based detection tools such as GPTZero without institutional hosting, a Purchasing contract, or student consent, citing FERPA — a data-handling restriction on ad hoc instructor use, not a statement that any detector is deployed, endorsed, or disabled
- Office in these sources
- Academic Integrity Office (AIO) · Humanities Social Sciences 2, Suite 271 · aio@ucsc.edu · no phone published on the office's own page
- Ombuds or advocacy office
- Office of the Ombuds — UCSC's own page describes it as serving "faculty, staff, and students at UC Santa Cruz" and self-describes as "Confidential - Informal - Impartial - Independent"; the office states, "We do not arbitrate, adjudicate, formally investigate or participate in any internal or external formal process" · deacker@ucsc.edu
- Sources last checked
- Sep 11, 2026
Reproduced from the institution's own pages quoted below — potentially relevant official sources, not a determination of which one governs any case.
UC Santa Cruz's published sources on AI detection and academic integrity, quoted and linked below. These are potentially relevant official sources, not a determination of which one governs any case — course syllabi, department rules, and instructor-facing guidance may also apply, and no UCSC-wide statement located in this review requires or forbids any particular detection method. Confirm applicability with the institution. Any dates are quoted from the sources, not a deadline calculation performed for you.
What UCSC's own pages say about detection tools
A named-vendor sweep (Turnitin, SimCheck, Originality, Copyleaks, iThenticate, GPTZero, Originality.ai, Winston AI, Crossplag, ZeroGPT, Packback, Grammarly Authorship, Honorlock, Proctorio, Respondus, Examity) and a category sweep (Information Technology Services' Canvas learning-management page and its comparison guide to campus-licensed AI tools, the Teaching and Learning Center's AI-and-academic-integrity guidance, and the campus's Generative AI FAQ) found no page naming any AI-text or plagiarism detector as deployed, licensed, or integrated with Canvas at UC Santa Cruz. ITS's own comparison guide (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) lists exactly three campus-licensed AI tools — Gemini Chat (Google), Gemini Notebook (Google), and Zoom AI Companion — none of them a detection tool, and the Canvas learning-management page (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) lists Gradescope, Hypothesis, Ed Discussion, and the YuJa Media Management System among integrated tools, again with no plagiarism or AI-writing checker named.
The Teaching and Learning Center's "AI and Academic Integrity" guidance (last modified Jan 27, 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) directs an instructor who suspects generative-AI use toward comparison, not a detector:
Source: AI and Academic Integrity — The Teaching and Learning Center. No detector is named on that page as one of the methods.
The campus's Generative AI FAQ (last updated Jul 20, 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) addresses a different question — not whether UCSC operates a detector, but when an instructor may submit student work to one at all. Answering "As an instructor, am I permitted to use AI tools to detect suspected student use of AI?", it states:
The FAQ then quotes that March 20, 2023 communication directly:
The FAQ closes the answer by directing an instructor with a suspected-misuse concern to the Teaching and Learning Center or the Academic Integrity Office rather than to a detection tool. Source: FAQ — Generative Artificial Intelligence at UC Santa Cruz. This is a data-handling condition, dated to a 2023 instructor memo, on ad hoc submission of student work to an outside service — it names GPTZero only as an example of what the condition covers, and it does not state that UCSC has adopted, licensed, disabled, or recommends against any detector of its own. Read against this collection's disqualification standard, it does not establish that no documented detector remains in use (no detector was ever documented as in use to begin with) or that a documented detector is disabled or recommended against (none is named). The finding here is an absence at the scope searched — named-vendor and category sweeps of ucsc.edu — not a considered campus position for or against AI-writing detection.
What UCSC's own pages say about how cases proceed
- Who may be present
- "Up to five (5) working days prior to the hearing date, the student may inform the Board of the intent to bring another person (e.g., friend, parent) to the hearing for support purposes only. Such a person may communicate quietly with the reported student but the visitor is not allowed to address Board members or participate in questioning or testimony. Supporting individuals may be asked to leave the hearing at any time." Recording is addressed in the University's own favor, not the student's: "A single recording is made of the hearing and is maintained by the University." — Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates (last modified Jun 22, 2026, effective Summer 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) · Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates
- What follows on the record
- "Academic misconduct records will be retained for five (5) years following the academic year in which the case is closed, except in cases resulting in dismissal. With dismissal, case records will be retained for 50 years following the academic year when the case is closed." Not stated in the sources reviewed: whether a sanction is separately noted on the academic transcript, or disclosed to a graduate program, employer, or licensing board. The same policy document was searched for this and states only the retention periods quoted above. — Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates (last modified Jun 22, 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) · Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates
The two questions an adviser raises first, answered from this institution's own published documents — or recorded as not stated in them.
From the Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates (last modified Jun 22, 2026, effective Summer 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026): an instructor who suspects misconduct is responsible for notifying the student and filing the case —
Where a case is contested or escalated, the policy sets the standard the Academic Review Board applies: the Board is to "determine, by a preponderance of the evidence, whether the student engaged in academic misconduct" — a more-likely-than-not standard. Sanctions run on a five-level scale, from a Level 1 warning letter paired with training, through Level 3 and 4 suspensions of one to three terms, to Level 5, "Permanent Dismissal from UCSC and the University of California." Appeal is to the Office of the Vice Provost and Dean of Undergraduate Education (VPDUE): "Any appeal must be made in writing and received by the Office of the VPDUE within ten (10) working days from the date on the letter or email that informs the student about the Review Board's decision," and is granted only on procedural error or violation of a student's due-process rights, or on evidence unavailable at the time of the hearing that would more likely than not have changed the Board's decision. Source: Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates. What any of this means for a particular case is for the institution and its process to determine.
Where the documents live
| Document | Location |
|---|---|
| Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates (process, sanctions, appeal, accompaniment, recording, record retention) | undergraduate.ucsc.edu — Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates (last modified Jun 22, 2026, effective Summer 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| Academic Integrity Office (office contact, location, hours) | undergraduate.ucsc.edu/our-units/academic-integrity-office (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| AI and Academic Integrity (instructor guidance, identification methods, no detector named) | tlc.ucsc.edu — AI and Academic Integrity (last modified Jan 27, 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| FAQ — Generative Artificial Intelligence at UC Santa Cruz (FERPA-based restriction on submitting student work to external detection tools) | campusai.ucsc.edu/faq (last updated Jul 20, 2026; retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| Guide: Comparison of Campus-Licensed AI Tools (no detection tool listed) | its.ucsc.edu — Guide: Comparison of Campus-Licensed AI Tools (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| Canvas Learning Management System (integrated tools list, no detection tool) | its.ucsc.edu — Canvas Learning Management System (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| Office of the Ombuds (who the office serves, self-description, scope) | ombuds.ucsc.edu (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
| Office of the Ombuds — contact | ombuds.ucsc.edu/about (retrieved Sep 11, 2026) |
Organizing your own drafts and records to bring to any of this: the records checklist. Capturing the pages above as they read today, and keeping your own dated record beside them: what to do with these sources.
Revision history of this page
2026-09-11 — Page created. First-party material captured from undergraduate.ucsc.edu (Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates, last modified Jun 22, 2026, effective Summer 2026; Academic Integrity Office contact page), tlc.ucsc.edu (AI and Academic Integrity, last modified Jan 27, 2026), campusai.ucsc.edu/faq (last updated Jul 20, 2026), its.ucsc.edu (Guide: Comparison of Campus-Licensed AI Tools; Canvas Learning Management System), and ombuds.ucsc.edu (home and contact pages). Detector sweep: named-vendor sweep (Turnitin, SimCheck, Originality, Copyleaks, iThenticate, GPTZero, Originality.ai, Winston AI, Crossplag, ZeroGPT, Packback, Grammarly Authorship, Honorlock, Proctorio, Respondus, Examity) and category sweep (ITS's Canvas and campus-AI-tools pages, the Teaching and Learning Center's AI-and-integrity guidance, the campus Generative AI FAQ) both came back with no AI-text or plagiarism detector named as deployed, licensed, or Canvas-integrated at UC Santa Cruz. Disqualification check: not disqualified. The one first-party statement bearing on detection tools — the Generative AI FAQ's FERPA-based condition on submitting student work to external web-based tools such as GPTZero — is a data-handling restriction on ad hoc, unauthorized use, not a statement that UCSC has adopted, licensed, disabled, or recommends against a detector; no detector was ever documented as in use, so neither disqualification branch (no documented detector remains in use; every detector found is disabled or recommended against) is met. This is an absence at the scope of the required sweeps, not a considered campus position, and is recorded as such rather than as a step-2 exclusion. UC-system caution: no system-level University of California detection position is on file in this collection; UC Davis and UC San Diego are Built with Turnitin documented, UC Berkeley is Excluded on a first-party opt-out statement, and this page is resolved on UCSC's own pages alone, consistent with that per-campus practice. Ombuds sweep (ombuds, ombudsperson, student advocacy, dean of students advocacy) found the Office of the Ombuds, re-established 2023, serving "faculty, staff, and students" generally — not limited to graduate students, staff, or a single school — so it is presented as a general resource; its self-description ("Confidential - Informal - Impartial - Independent") and its statement "We do not arbitrate, adjudicate, formally investigate or participate in any internal or external formal process" are both quoted from the office's own pages. No phone number is published on either the Office of the Ombuds' home or contact page; only a named staff email (deacker@ucsc.edu) is listed there, and that is the address used in the docket. No phone number is published on the Academic Integrity Office's own contact page either; only aio@ucsc.edu, a building and suite number, and drop-in hours are listed there. Record row: the Academic Integrity Policy for Undergraduates states record-retention periods (five years generally, fifty years following dismissal) but does not state whether a sanction is separately noted on the academic transcript or disclosed to a graduate program, employer, or licensing board; that gap is recorded as not stated in the sources reviewed rather than assumed either way, and the Registrar's own "Academic Integrity" navigator page was checked and redirects to the same policy document rather than adding anything. One page found and deliberately not used as evidence of a deployed detector: a URL purporting to be a "Duplichecker vs Turnitin" comparison on a ucsc.edu subdomain (fis-prd-esm-2.ucsc.edu) surfaced in search results but does not resolve (DNS lookup failure) and was not treated as first-party content. Nothing paraphrase-pending. Archive captures not requested this pass (unattended scheduled run). Reviewer: Carrie Schluter (review confirmed 2026-09-11).
2026-09-13 — Editorial review. Carrie Schluter read this page in full against its recorded first-party sources and found no change required. Reviewer: Carrie Schluter (review confirmed 2026-09-13).
Spot an error or an outdated quotation? hello@gatheredwork.com — corrections are made on the record, in this log.