diff --git a/lucene/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/QueryUtils.java b/lucene/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/QueryUtils.java
index 6724f8143ed..80b2e6c9a0e 100644
--- a/lucene/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/QueryUtils.java
+++ b/lucene/test-framework/src/java/org/apache/lucene/search/QueryUtils.java
@@ -360,8 +360,8 @@ public class QueryUtils {
       }
   }
     
-  // check that first skip on just created scorers always goes to the right doc
-  private static void checkFirstSkipTo(final Query q, final IndexSearcher s) throws IOException {
+  /** check that first skip on just created scorers always goes to the right doc */
+  public static void checkFirstSkipTo(final Query q, final IndexSearcher s) throws IOException {
     //System.out.println("checkFirstSkipTo: "+q);
     final float maxDiff = 1e-3f;
     final int lastDoc[] = {-1};