diff --git a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt
index 1eb0807404..b710400c04 100644
--- a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt
+++ b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/CHANGES.txt
@@ -1703,6 +1703,9 @@ Release 0.23.0 - Unreleased
     MAPREDUCE-3212. Fix usage/help message for bin/yarn. (Bhallamudi Venkata 
     Siva Kamesh via acmurthy) 
 
+    MAPREDUCE-3179. Ensure failed tests exit with right error code. (Jonathan
+    Eagles via acmurthy)
+
 Release 0.22.0 - Unreleased
 
   INCOMPATIBLE CHANGES
diff --git a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/src/test/mapred/org/apache/hadoop/test/MapredTestDriver.java b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/src/test/mapred/org/apache/hadoop/test/MapredTestDriver.java
index 26747cd5f2..4ab14adba1 100644
--- a/hadoop-mapreduce-project/src/test/mapred/org/apache/hadoop/test/MapredTestDriver.java
+++ b/hadoop-mapreduce-project/src/test/mapred/org/apache/hadoop/test/MapredTestDriver.java
@@ -107,11 +107,13 @@ public MapredTestDriver(ProgramDriver pgd) {
   }
 
   public void run(String argv[]) {
+    int exitCode = -1;
     try {
-      pgd.driver(argv);
+      exitCode = pgd.driver(argv);
     } catch(Throwable e) {
       e.printStackTrace();
     }
+    System.exit(exitCode);
   }
 
   public static void main(String argv[]){