The authors report on three case studies of ESL students who are taking courses to enter professional programs. The goal of the study reported in this article is to examine ESL students' language and general academic performance in content-area classes at one open-access college of a large midwestern university. The authors were particularly interested in the ways that the students completed their assignments, participated in class, and interacted with professors and peers in their content-area classes. Exploring the issues that challenge these students may indicate strategies that could help such students to reach their professional goals, and may offer ways for teachers of composition to support and prepare these students. (Contains 1 note and a list of works cited.)