Employment: Former university professor’s suit is largely reinstated

Where a reasonable jury could find that a university discriminated and retaliated against a professor, and paid her less because of her sex, the district court erred when it found for the university on these claims.

Background

Dr. Leah Hollis alleges that in her former job as a professor at Morgan State University, the university denied her promotions multiple times because of her sex, paid her less than her male colleagues and retaliated against her when she formally complained of this discrimination. She claims that this conduct violated Title VII, Title IX, 42 U.S.C. 1983 and Maryland state law. The district court granted summary judgment to the defendants.

Timeliness

Dr. Hollis received a right-to-sue notice for her 2019 claim on Feb. 9, 2021. But she did not amend her pending complaint, challenging the denial of her 2016 application for promotion and tenure, until 140 days after the right-to-sue notice, and well outside the statutory deadline.

Dr. Hollis argues that the 2019 claim “relates back” to the 2016 claim in that complaint. But Dr. Hollis’s 2019 claim does not arise from the same conduct or occurrences as her 2016 claim, instead adding new facts to form the basis for a new claim. It follows, then, that Dr. Hollis’s Title VII sex discrimination claim regarding her 2020 application is likewise barred.

For the same reasons, the district court also granted MSU summary judgment on her Title IX, § 1983 and Maryland Fair Employment Practices Act claims as to 2019 and 2020. But those provisions are not governed by the Title VII procedural requirements at issue here. The district court’s summary judgment ruling as to these claims is thus reversed.

Discrimination

Dr. Hollis claims that MSU unlawfully discriminated against her by failing to promote her to associate professor with tenure when she applied in 2016. Dr. Hollis argues that a reasonable jury could infer – based on statements of animus, treatment of comparators and evidence that MSU’s stated and shifting rationales were pretextual – that the reason she was denied the promotion was because of her sex. The court agrees, and concludes that this claim rests on disputes of material fact that are for a jury to decide.

Retaliation

Dr. Hollis engaged in protected activity. The defendants have advanced a non-retaliatory and legitimate reason for Dr. Hollis’s demotion to at-will status: the purported discovery in December 2017 that she had never been renewed for a second three-year term as an assistant professor.

But there is record evidence from which a reasonable jury could conclude that MSU did not actually believe that Dr. Hollis’s contract had lapsed, and was instead using that excuse as a pretext to mask the real reason for its decisions. Taking all the evidence together, these disputes would allow a reasonable jury to conclude that the defendants’ rationale was pretextual and to infer that a retaliatory motive was the “real reason” for her demotion.

Wage

The district court concluded, and the defendants do not contest on appeal, that Dr. Hollis established a prima facie case of wage discrimination. MSU argues that it paid Dr. Hollis’s male colleagues higher starting salaries primarily because they were better qualified. But a jury also could doubt whether MSU “in fact objectively weighed the comparators’ qualifications” in the way it now posits.

Moreover, Dr. Hollis’s wage discrimination claim extends beyond the time of her initial hiring, and rests on evidence that a pay disparity between herself and her male colleagues persisted throughout her time at MSU. And Dr. Hollis has identified evidence that after her original hiring, she developed a publication record equal or superior to that of her male comparators, as well as other strong qualifications.

According to MSU, so long as the initial disparity in starting salaries was based on qualifications and not sex, then continuing salary differentials “based on [the] unequal starting salaries” do not violate the Equal Pay Act. But by its own terms, that theory would not apply to cases like this one, where an employee’s subsequent salary is not based solely on her starting salary, but can instead be increased, or not, at the discretion of her employer for lawful or discriminatory reasons.

Affirmed in part, reversed in part and remanded.

Concurring opinion

Quattlebaum, J., concurring:

While I fully join in the majority’s decision, I join those urging the Supreme Court to clarify or overturn McDonnell Douglas.

Hollis v. Morgan State University, Case No. 24-1476, Aug. 28, 2025. 4th Cir. (Harris), from DMD at Baltimore (Griggsby). Regina Wang for Appellant. Courtney Morgan Watkins for Appellees. VLW 025-2-354. 47 pp.

Editor’s note: A version of this digest that appeared in the Sept. 8, 2025, print issue misidentified the case as VLW No. 025-2-356.