A recent study has found about 10 per cent of future teachers fail to meet required standards of literacy and numeracy.

Close to 5,000 students sat a test designed to ensure teaching graduates are in the top 30 per cent of the population for literacy and numeracy.

The testing was conducted in capital cities and several large rural centres across Australia, and of the students who took part, 92 per cent passed the literacy test and 90 per cent passed numeracy.

The result suggested that if the rates from the pilot study were extended to the entire teaching graduate cohort, about 1,800 would have failed to make the grade last year alone.

New rules coming in next year will make the test mandatory from July, meaning students must pass before they can graduate and enter the classroom.

Federal Education Minister Simon Birmingham said the findings justified the Government’s push to boost teacher quality.

“Parents, principals, all stakeholders in school education should have complete confidence that graduates from our universities with teaching qualifications are among some of the best and brightest in the land,” Senator Birmingham said.

“We're really putting it on the universities who are training our teachers to make sure they have confidence in the capabilities of teachers before they graduate.

“We think that it's quite fair and reasonable that universities, as the providers of teaching graduates, should be providing teaching graduates that are of the highest possible standard.”

When the test is imposed next year, universities will have to decide whether they set the test as an entry requirement or impose it during teaching training.