Plagiarism Detection Solution

The City University of New York is requesting proposals for a plagiarism detection and academic integrity platform serving 26 campuses and approximately 230,000 students under RFP UCO 1015, with proposals due July 29, 2026 at 2:00 PM Eastern Time. SDVOB participation goal of 6% and MWBE participation goal of 30% apply. TurnitIn, LLC is the incumbent.

Proposers must demonstrate at least three years of verifiable experience providing plagiarism detection solutions to higher education institutions of comparable size and complexity, with successful implementation at three colleges or universities including systemwide environments. The platform must detect plagiarism, text manipulation, and AI-generated content with minimum 95% accuracy; support cross-submission and cohort-based comparison; provide authorship verification and stylometrics analysis; integrate with Brightspace by D2L via LTI 1.3, RESTful API, SAML 2.0, OAuth 2.0, and LDAP; and operate as a standalone web-based solution with multi-campus configurations and segregated environments. Compliance with Section 508, WCAG 2.2 AA, FERPA, GDPR, and CUNY's cybersecurity policies (SOC 2 Type II or SSAE 18 reporting, TLS 1.2 or higher encryption in transit, AES-256 at rest) is mandatory. The solution must maintain 99.5% uptime monthly with no more than 16 hours of scheduled maintenance outside business hours and provide 24/7 support with SLA response times from one hour for Priority I incidents to two business days for general inquiries. Training of up to 75 hours must cover administrator, end-user train-the-trainer, and ad-hoc models with accessible materials.

Pricing must be firm fixed for all five contract years and include one-time implementation costs broken down by six milestones, training costs, and annual service fees covering licensing, hosting, maintenance, and support across the phased rollout. The initial contract term is three years commencing upon Attorney General and New York State Comptroller approval, with optional renewal of up to two additional years. Implementation begins January 2027, with pilot go-live in Q2 2027 and university-wide rollout in Q3/Q4 2027. Evaluation comprises administrative review, short-listing, product demonstrations, technical proposal (50 points), oral presentation and product demonstration (20 points), price (25 points), and diversity practices questionnaire (5 points). Written questions are due July 7 and July 16, 2026. Contractors must carry professional liability insurance of at least $2 million and cyber extortion coverage of $5–$10 million.