After the Central Student Judiciary ruled the Michigan Student Assembly-led Constitutional Convention unconstitutional, the leaders of the former convention and 20 of its members formed a student group to continue the convention’s efforts to amend the campus-wide constitution.

On Sept. 29, MSA created the Constitutional Convention in hopes of amending the student constitution, but CSJ ruled on Nov. 23 that the convention’s participants were not properly elected.

Students interested in the original convention submitted applications to MSA President Abhishek Mahanti, who then selected about 40 applicants and presented their names to the assembly for approval. CSJ ruled that this process did not constitute an election as required by the constitution and ordered the Constitutional Convention be disbanded.

Immediately after the trial, members of the former convention mobilized to create the student group Students for Progressive Governance to continue the effort to revise the constitution.

Amendments can be added to a student-wide ballot one of three ways: by a duly created constitutional convention, a two-thirds majority vote by MSA, or by an individual student or student group with 1,000 student signatures in support of the changes.

About 20 members of the former Constitutional Convention have expressed interest in the student group, according to MSA Vice President Mike Rorro, former chair of the convention.

MSA Student General Counsel Jim Brusstar, former convention secretary, and MSA Rules and Elections Committee Chair Michael Benson, former convention vice chair, will also be involved in the new student group.

Rorro said that although many of the student group members are former convention members, and the group retains the same leadership, this student group is distinctly different.

“It’s not the same thing, even though there are some of the same people involved in it, we recognize that, we’re not trying to hide that,” Rorro said. “We’re not trying to seclude ourselves within the same group of people and continue work by limiting people.”

Former MSA Rep. Tim Hull disagrees. Hull said the involvement of MSA executive board members in the student group makes it hard to believe the group is really separate from MSA.

“MSA execs are participating in it and I feel, (though) that might be permissible under the Constitution, the circumstances behind the formation of this group make it hard to confer legitimacy,” Hull said.

Rorro said the group acknowledges that there are members who also serve on MSA, but since the attempt to amend the constitution through a body connected to MSA failed, forming a student group is the best option.

“We ran for student government to fix things and to make it a better University and unfortunately we couldn’t do that through the MSA’s procedure, because it’s not well-defined and it continues to not be well-defined,” Rorro said.

According to the group leaders, one of the goals of the revisions will be to clarify the procedures within the constitution that the convention violated.

“We attempted to work within the process and were unable to," Benson said. "One of the reasons we’re trying to change this document is to make it so things are easier, (so) it’s clear."

To become a member of the student group, a student must be nominated by a current member and then garner a majority vote of the group.