No one, least of all educators, would dispute that scholarly collaboration by all players in the educational pipeline is key to the seamless, successful progression of students from pre-K to university study. In reality, mutually defining the learning expectations common to K-12 and higher education often devolves into finger-pointing and not-so-veiled criticism. Fueled by competition for scarce public resources, disparate challenges, and seemingly disconnected goals, public schools and the colleges and universities they feed students into frequently appear more adversarial than collegial. These challenges notwithstanding, during the past two years, over 100 faculty from five school districts, two non-public postsecondary institutions, nine state universities, and 24 Florida state colleges worked together without special compensation on a project to improve college readiness. In this article, the author describes Florida's path to a new, customized placement test which is the result of a statewide movement toward a common definition of college and career readiness that pinpoints specifically what students need to know and the competencies they need to have to succeed in their first college-level English and math classes. The process, which initially relied upon faculty's subject-matter expertise, soon became a classic example of success nurtured by professional respect, dedication to a common goal, and ongoing communication between college faculty and their K-12 counterparts.