"I was one of those people that was really looking to escape," Peyton said. "Coming to Michigan State was intimidating; I felt like they made a mistake when they accepted me. I suffered from imposter syndrome and didn't want them to discover me. I wanted to stay out of the spotlight."

That feeling wouldn’t last long. Peyton would later make the decision to become a Resident Hall Assistant, where he had his first experiences with leadership and developing a sense of "consciousness."

It began with curating a bulletin board for Black History Month for the Black Student Caucus. While Peyton admired many of the Black heroes known nationwide, like Harriet Tubman, Frederick Douglass and Malcolm X, he didn’t want the board to be "typical" or "cliche." He narrowed his focus to those at Michigan State, starting off with those who had become "firsts" like Clifton Wharton, the first Black president of a Big Ten university. Peyton would spend hours in the MSU library looking through old State News clippings. 

"I discovered things like the first Black graduate, the first Black fraternity, sorority, and the first distinguished professors and all of those different types of things," Peyton said. 

He would eventually become the president of the Black Student Caucus in Wonders Hall. 

The sit-in

Tensions had been brewing on campuses across the country at the time, including Wayne State University, with more and more Black students organizing to protest the conditions of their educational environments. At MSU, Peyton, alongside other Black student leaders, started hosting "a series of late night talks and discussions."

These discussions would be purposefully cloaked in "mystery" and "intrigue" as students were told to meet underneath a random lamppost on a random street corner. There, they would discuss issues relevant to Black students at MSU. 

The call for action originated at a late-night meeting in Wonders Kiva. 

As the student-appointed spokesperson, Peyton would be in charge of organizing the sit-in, which he did in collaboration with MSU Black Alumni and Black faculty on campus. A source of inspiration for the student organizers had been the protesters from the 1960s and 1970s who’d advocated for similar, if not the same, causes. Though the students did not divulge the specifics of their plans yet, Peyton said. 

"We didn't tell them what we were going to do, because, you know, you don't want to put them in a position," Peyton said. "But we were not strangers when we did eventually take over that building."

At 4:30 p.m. on May 9, 1989, around 70 Black MSU students entered the halls of the Hannah Administration Building. As faculty retired for the evening, students were instead setting up multiple changes of clothes and pillows for the night. They were instructed to bring rolls of quarters for payphones, as well as their textbooks. When students had questions, they turned to Peyton for answers. 

"We purposely called it (a) 'study-in' because of the negative connotations to 'sit-in,' but it is what it is, it’s sitting in," Peyton said. "We were students, so we said 'this is going to be a study-in.'"

Prior to the sit-in, numerous Black organizations on MSU’s campus had petitioned with the administration regarding retention rates and racism on campus. In 1989, only 30% of Black students would graduate within four years. 

Students wore shirts branded with the phrase "BY ANY MEANS NECESSARY," taken from Malcolm X’s speech given in 1964 to commemorate the founding of the Organization of Afro-American Unity. The same speech acts as the opening clip and title of a documentary made by Peyton about the student protest. 

By May 11, the number of students reached around 300. At times, the number of students had looked to exceed 400, but some were sent home. The group set up camp on the first floor of Hannah Administration Building, but had yet to expand and couldn’t accommodate a larger group.

"Now, the building was still operational, except for that first floor, but I knew it would be risky to go on those different levels, because then you're divided," Peyton said.

Within the building, student leaders would meet with MSU President John A. DiBaggio and other members of the administration to negotiate. The rest of the students would watch motivational tapes of Martin Luther King Jr. or Malcolm X. Outside, there were marches in support of the sit-in. 

"By participating in an event such as that historical event, you felt ownership of the university," Peyton said. "People actually walked out feeling more green and white than when they walked in … I mean, I wear my Spartan colors proudly. It gave us a sense of ownership, the fact that we participated in that."

A persisting legacy 

However, 1989 would not mark the last time Black students on campus would mobilize to protest issues of systemic racism. In 2011, Black students led a silent march through campus after studying the practices of the 1989 sit-in. In 2019, Black Girls Unite held a march in Wells Hall before moving to protest in the Hannah Administration Building following a series of reported racist incidents on campus.  

For the Black Students’ Alliance, graduation and retention rates for Black students on campus continues to be a pressing issue that the student organization is actively working with the MSU administration to improve. According to last year's Diversity, Equity and Inclusion Report, the average graduation rate for African American/Black students in 2023 was 65%, which was 17% less than the average for all students. The average persistence rate for Black students was 88.1%, which was 3.3% less than the average for all students.

BSA has worked with the Black Faculty Staff Association and MSU Black Alumni to create a position paper that outlines a series of initiatives they hope to accomplish by 2030 to increase graduation and retention rates for Black students. One of these initiatives includes potentially introducing a Living Learning Community to "ensure that students feel safe and actually have some sort of community on this campus," BSA Internal President Angel Noaks said. 

BSA hosted Peyton and a series of other student leaders from the 1989 sit-in last year during one of their meetings, where they were encouraged to "fight for what they believe in."

The sit-in was also referenced when creating the "Hate Has a Home Here" campaign launched by BSA in November of 2024. 

Asked how students should approach activism on campus, Peyton said "not everyone can be a leader, but everyone can be engaged."

"So find a way to be engaged, to trigger that self discovery, passion and social intelligence," he said. 

The alumni networks that BSA has curated have been instrumental in maintaining "support" for the organization and its various campaigns.

"I thank them for their efforts, and I let them know that the work is not done," Noaks said. "We're going to continue to advocate on their behalf and also for the behalf of the students now."