As I've lurked over the past several years on a national listserv for teachers of development writing, I've often been pleased to find posts written by John Lovas—witty, engaging, insightful and always passionate in discussing ways to help student writers find their own voices. I've appreciated how articulately John represents what we do at De Anza to such national forums and how generous he's been in bringing back the knowledge he's gained elsewhere. When the English Department began to explore how we might replace our Writing Assessment Test (WAT) with portfolios, John knew just the right person to help us frame our questions, a national expert who could summarize best-practices and years of research. John was able to arrange for her to come to De Anza to talk with us about what might work here, speeding our transition to portfolios immeasurably.