Rails - Sep 2005 - search engine, select the selected option

hey, i have a search engine that let u search on the an employee
how can i make that if the user select "employee1" , on the next page 
"employee1" is selected

this is my code (rhtml)

<tr>
	<td><label
for="employee_id">Employee</label></td>
	<td colspan="3"><%= select "employee",
"id", @employees.collect {|e|
[e.last_name + " " + e.first_name,e.id]} %></td>
</tr>

code controller

@employees = Employee.find_all_by_firm_id(firm_id, :order =>"last_name
ASC")
@geotags = Geotag.find_all_by_firm_id(firm_id, :order =>"address1
ASC")

@employee_id = params[:employee][:id].blank? ? '''' :
params[:employee][:id]
@geotag_id = params[:geotag][:id].blank? ? '''' :
params[:geotag][:id]

@time_entries = TimeEntry.find(:all, :conditions
=>["time_entries.firm_id =
? AND employee_id like ? and geotag_id like ?", firm_id, 
"%#{@employee_id}%", "%#{@geotag_id}%"], :order =>
"time_entries.start_time
DESC", :include=>[:employee,:geotag])