The origins of the gap between academic potential and written performance in BSN Writing Services nursing students are multiple and varied, and they resist any single simple explanation. Educational history plays a significant role. Students who attended schools where writing instruction was minimal, where feedback on written work was rare or unhelpfully general, or where the academic expectations were significantly lower than those of a rigorous BSN program arrive at university with writing habits that may be adequate for the contexts in which they were developed but that are insufficient for the demands of nursing scholarship. These students are not less intelligent or less capable than their peers who received stronger writing preparation. They are students whose potential has been developing in directions that did not include extensive practice in formal academic writing, and who now need to develop that practice within the compressed timeline of an undergraduate program that has many other demands on their attention and energy.