One of the largest producers of mozzarella cheese in the world has entered into a consent decree to pay $550,000 to settle allegations of hiring discrimination via a pre-employment test, the Office of Federal Contract Compliance Programs announces.

OFCCP says 253 qualified Asian, Hispanic and African-American job applicants who were rejected for employment at Leprino Foods will share in the award. The consent decree resolves OFCCP's allegations that the company’s use of a pre-employment test called “WorkKeys” to select hires for on-call laborer positions resulted in discrimination. OFCCP's investigation found that the WorkKeys exam was not job-related and disproportionately screened out minority job applicants based on skills that were not critical to the entry-level tasks actually performed by on-call laborers. Under the terms of the consent decree, Leprino has agreed to discontinue use of the test for this purpose, undertake extensive self-monitoring measures, hire at least 13 of the original class members and immediately correct any discriminatory practices.