Even though most of their efforts may seem to be concentrated in the lab, scientists spend a lot of time writing. "Scientists need to know how to write to get their work published and get grants—it's an important skill that people assume they already have [once they reach a certain level], so no one ever teaches them how to write well in these specific formats," said Kristin Sainani, a health policy professor at Stanford University who teaches both undergraduate and online courses about writing in the sciences. "In science, research is king, and it's important," she said, but over the past decade universities have started to pay more attention to the "soft skills" that scientists also need.

But explaining science is just as valuable for the lay public as it is for the scientists themselves. "Science has become more complex, more specialized—every sub-discipline has its own vocabulary," Hall said. Scientists at all levels have to work hard to explain niche research to the general public, he added, but it's increasingly important for the average person to understand. That's because their research has become central to many other elements of society, influencing realms that may have previously seemed far from scientific rigors.

Olivia Wilkins, a post-doctoral fellow who studies plant genetics at New York University's Center for Genomics and Systems Biology, recently took Hall's four-session workshop. She wanted to be a better writer, she said, because she wanted her research to matter. "Science is a group effort. We may be in different labs at different universities, but ultimately, many of us are working towards the same goals. I want to get other people as excited about my work as I am, and I believe that one of the ways to do this is through better writing."

Wilkins got a lot out of Hall's workshops, but she struggled at times—a fairly common sentiment among students. The NYU workshops may sound unappealing; they're not for credit and each session lasts three hours per week (not counting homework) for four weeks. But the numbers say otherwise; for the fall 2014 semester over 160 scientists applied for 40 spots, likely because of how useful it is.

The NYU course is one of several of its kind offered across the country for undergraduates and doctorate students in formats ranging from massive open online courses (like one that Sainani teaches) to small workshops and everything in between. Most of the courses are taught by writers with less science background than their students. "In my syllabi I tell my students, 'You are the technical experts, you know more than I do, no question about that. I may not catch if you name the wrong protein, but I'm going to know if you described this well enough to be comprehensible,'" said Katie Rodger, a faculty member who, among other writing courses, teaches writing for scientists at University of California, Davis.*