University vice-chancellors in Australia have rejected a government plan that would require their students to sit a graduate skills assessment test and publish the results.
The GSA test is intended to measure widely-applicable skills thought to be relevant when graduates enter the workforce.
The test covers critical thinking, problem solving, 'interpersonal understandings' and written communication via 70 multiple-choice questions and a separate 60-minute section of two writing tasks.
Although the test was intended to assist universities better prepare their graduates for work, few students sit for it and the Australian Vice-chancellors' Committee said they should not be forced to.
But Education Minister Dr Brendan Nelson claimed employers were increasingly critical of new graduates who could not function effectively when they started work.
One investigation into employer satisfaction with graduates entering the labour market found an astonishingly large proportion of graduates - more than three in every four - were considered unsuitable by employers even for other positions within the organisation.