1. Whether (1) a statement by a university dean,
made during the time that the university was
deciding whether or not to renew the contract of a
then-79-year-old professor, that the professor "would have great difficulty with any [teaching] changes" and
(2) a designation by the 79-year-old professor's
department chair during this same time frame, that the professor was "retiring" when, in fact, she was not,
constitute, individually or collectively, direct evidence
of age discrimination.

2. Where an employer's proffered legitimate nondiscriminatory reason for taking an allegedly
discriminatory adverse action against an employee is that the employee is not meeting the employer's
"legitimate expectations," is it appropriate for a court
to consider that allegedly non-discriminatory reason during the initial prima facie stage of the McDonnell
Douglas framework, as held by the Fourth Circuit, or
does such consideration improperly import the later stages of the McDonnell Douglas inquiry into the
prima facie case analysis and thereby create too high
an evidentiary bar for a plai ntiff to be able to prove a
prima facie case of discrimination, as held by the Sixth and Eighth Circuits?

3. Whether the Fourth Circuit's majority decision
that affirmed a grant of summary judgment to the
defendant/appellee erroneously "failed to view the record evidence at summary judgment in the light
most favorable to [the plaintiff] with respect to the
central facts of this case" su ch that it requires this
Court's intervention in order to correct the Fourth Circuit's "clear misapprehension of summary
judgment standards." Tolan v. Cotton , 572 U.S. 650,
657, 659 (2014).

4. Whether a career art professor employed by a
religious university who during her employment (i)
was never been tasked with performing any religious
duties, (ii) had never taught theology or religious
studies and, instead, had only taught art classes; (iii)
did not lead her students in worship or Bible-study; (iv) did not give sermons or tell her students what to
believe or no to believe; (v) did not lead her students to or from any worship servic es or chapel; and (vi) did
not hold herself out as a minister was a "minister" for purposes of the First Amendment's "ministerial
exception," as adopted and applied in Our Lady of
Guadalupe v. Morrissey-Berru , ___, U.S., ___, 140 S.
Ct. 2014 (2020) and Hosanna-Tabo r Evangelical
Lutheran Church & School v. EEOC , 565 U.S. 171
(2012).

Whether a statement by a university dean and a designation by a professor's department chair constitute direct evidence of age discrimination