I''m in the position where I want to redirect_to a form and populate a few of the values to make things easier on the user (say, if I know the user is going to use the form 3 times but some of the data will remain the same). I accomplish it like this: def add @inventory = Inventory.new(params[:inventory]) end And then, somewhere else... redirect to :action => :add, "inventory[tracking_number]" => 5 This works (although, is there a better, more rails-like way to do this?). It doesn''t work however when I have a date_select. I would expect this to work redirect to :action => :add, "inventory[invoice_on]" => Date.parse("8/4/1954") But the date selects do not change. Do I really need to manually break up the date into month/day/year and pass each one as a parameter? I''m new to all this and feel like I''m missing a rails-like solution.