Recent legislation and education standards focus on the importance of developing students' academic and professional writing skills. Research on the teaching of writing has articulated the types of texts and features of writing that students need to produce to succeed. At the same time, studies of writing in adult education have found that limited time is devoted to writing instruction. The experiences and needs of adults learning English as an additional language (L2 learners) are often not understood and met by teachers, and teachers often have limited professional development in the effective teaching of writing to adults. This article reviews this research and reports the results of a survey of over 400 teachers of L2 learners in adult education across the United States about their teaching of writing. The results show some positive trends and a number of challenges. As a field, we need to work together to understand the qualities of academic and professional writing that students need to produce and to implement effective instruction in adult education, community college, and university programs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]