Your undergraduate student government charges you $13.75 every semester.

This year it's lobbied against Proposal 2, fought drinking game bans, spent almost $36,000 on upgrades to its offices, voted against opening the Red Cedar River to fishing and questioned administration officials on the new residential college that was slated for the 2005 school year.

So the perennial question on ASMSU representatives' minds is: Do students know what we do?

Well, do they?

Outreach has long been a self-acknowledged problem for ASMSU, especially when considering its responsibility to student taxpayers with an operating budget of about $850,000.

To remedy this problem and others within ASMSU, a small group of about seven of roughly 25 members of Academic Assembly are lobbying for internal change.

This small faction of students argues for the combination of ASMSU's two assemblies, student and academic, into a one-body system with a popularly elected president to make its actions more accountable to students.

ASMSU is separated into two assemblies, each with its own chairperson, that debate issues such as tailgating and academic honesty in the appropriate assembly.

But the idea of merging the two assemblies isn't new this year.

It's been argued, debated and almost adopted in ASMSU since 1991, when the then-Student Assembly and then-Student Council, which concentrated on academic issues, fused together to create ASMSU. The constitution kept the assemblies separate.

But for as many ASMSU representatives that want to change the system, there are more that want it to stay the same.

They say ASMSU's bicameral system is what makes it unique - so unique that other universities with unicameral systems call to inquire about how effective a two-party system is.

The faction of students for change say now is the time ,because if students don't know what ASMSU does, it hinges on the brink of being labeled illegitimate.

The reformers

Some of these reformists sit on the Constitutional Convention Committee, a body formed last year to examine ASMSU's structure and determine the most efficient way to use student tax dollars. The committee will propose changes to ASMSU's constitution at its annual joint assembly meeting in January.

These changes might include eliminating a risk-management fund that stores unused student tax dollars every year. The account currently holds about $600,000.

Brian Forest, an ASMSU representative for the College of Arts & Letters, joined ASMSU last fall and said he started to notice problems in the undergraduate student government. He was quiet at first with his frustrations, but then began to question how effective and accountable MSU's student government leaders really are. He asked if students know how their tax dollars are used in ASMSU's system.

"I started seeing the insanely complicated structure that is ASMSU, and having been a member of it for a month or two, I still didn't understand how it worked," he said.

He said the current system with separate assemblies and chairpersons makes it tough for students to single out their student government leader to praise or blame.

"If I'm a student pissed off at (Student Assembly Chairperson Andrew) Schepers, I can't change that," Forest said.

Chairpersons on Student and Academic assemblies are currently voted to the position by assembly representatives, not directly by students.

That's why Forest said he is part of the reform alliance.

The alliance is a band of students within ASMSU looking to change its structure to make the government more accountable to student taxpayers. He cautions that the alliance isn't a voting bloc or a student "party," but instead a "pro-student" and "pro-reformist" group.

Forest's vision morphs ASMSU's bicameral system into a unicameral body with a president voted by students. The president would serve as the top spokesperson for students, arguing on behalf of city, campus and academic issues.

Forest envisions the president as the ultimate lobbyist for students.

"He could say, 'I was elected by students, so I'm a real voice,'" Forest said. "There's one official to turn to and say, 'He's responsible.'"

He says his system allows students to hold ASMSU accountable - something that doesn't happen right now.

"A lot of people have a vested interest in the way it is right now because it's easier for them," he said. "The problem is that it doesn't work."

Forest's main point in his fight to change the structure is outreach - not enough students know of ASMSU, and for that matter, how it spends their $13.75.

"The way it is now, there's no accountability or legitimacy," Forest said. "We're in a crisis of legitimacy at the brink of being called illegitimate - that's unacceptable because we're a government propped up by the students' tax dollar."

He said his system would resemble a French model of government, where the president deals with external affairs and an assembly chairperson treats internal affairs.

Another reformer sitting with Forest on the Constitutional Convention Committee is Derek Wallbank.

A seasoned ASMSU representative, serving for two years, Wallbank recently announced his bid for East Lansing City Council.

Wallbank said his problems with ASMSU's structure are best told by a friend who said "If I can't understand it, it needs to be simpler."

The Student Assembly representative for the Council for Students with Disabilities isn't shy about detailing his alternative to the bicameral ASMSU.

Although not part of the "alliance," Wallbank said he wants a unicameral system and student president.

He said ASMSU's biggest problem is that its structure isn't simple enough, so it creates an alien government for students.

His plan is similar to Forest's, electing a general president who would have duties to both assemblies.

Most importantly, Wallbank says, his plan reduces the number of paid positions on ASMSU by almost half.

"The key to this is that it takes the number of people necessary to do ASMSU from 140 to 80," he said.

Wallbank says ASMSU's problem of filling seats on both assemblies would be fixed by combining the two to make a more efficient governing body.

"When you need 140 people to run student government, it's a little much," he said. "(This) would be a lot more efficient, easier to manage and cut down on absenteeism."

And representatives' apathy might be resolved if they were able to vote on all the issues affecting students, including those in academics and student-city relations, he said.

Wallbank addressed apathy on Nov. 11 when representatives were aching to leave at the end of a Student Assembly meeting.

"The assembly tends to have a 9 p.m. bedtime. Maybe we ought to move our bedtime back to 11 p.m.," he said. "We need representatives to step up to the plate and do more.

"We can't have them saying, 'Oh my God it's 8 p.m. I think I'm going to miss my TV show.' We need representatives to stick a tape in the VCR and say, 'Lets go to work.'"

Staying the course

After four years of legislating through riots, new East Lansing noise ordinances, university budget cuts, a derogatory anti-University of Michigan T-shirt fiasco and tailgating restrictions, Student Assembly Chairperson Andrew Schepers said he can't see changing a system that works so well.

"We're an organization that represents over 30,000 students with lots of issues that tend to come up very quick and fast," he said. "I've looked at other ways back when I was a representative, but after being involved in it a lot, I come to the point that the system we have currently makes us more effective than if we were to have a student-elected president."

Schepers said he can understand representatives calling for change because he used to be one of them, but he says a conglomeration of the current academic and student assemblies would overburden ASMSU.

"There's so much outreaching and so much more networking and lobbying, for us to be one general body to work I know would hinder the effectiveness that we have to deal with issues on campus," he said.

And with one general assembly to vote on all issues, representatives might not be as well-versed about specific issues, he said.

Schepers said ASMSU can't be called illegitimate because of its involvement in tailgating reforms and its soon-to-be new Web site, which he says will hold representatives more accountable, because students can easily contact them.

He added that a president doesn't necessarily make ASMSU more legitimate.

"Our democratic process makes us look to vote for one leader - you get that warm fuzzy feeling because that's what they're used to," Schepers said. "But how laws are passed don't come from the executive, they come from representatives - that's where the power comes from."

And students don't need a president if they want their voice to be heard on ASMSU election day, Schepers said.

"Students have a chance to make their voices known when they have the chance to elect their representatives to represent them," he said.

Right now, Student Assembly meetings average three hours, and Academic Assembly usually pushes two and a half.

Schepers said if ASMSU ever turned into a body that reviewed all student government concerns, representatives and staff wouldn't have time to be students.

"How does that executive represent everybody and when does that executive go to class?" he asked. "You don't give up your right to be a student with this job."

ASMSU's other chairperson, Dan Weber of Academic Assembly, is more shy in his support of a bicameral system, but he says it's probably the best option for now.

"Just because you change how things are done doesn't mean you fix the problems - you can't assume a structural change will cure all your ills," he said.

Weber said he's open to any new ideas, but he used Grand Valley State University's student government meetings, which can sometimes last six hours, as an example.

Anita Leung, vice chairwoman of the Association of Michigan Universities, an alliance of student governments from Michigan's 15 public colleges and universities, added that unicameral systems with presidential races often can lead to a name-recognition contest instead of focusing on issues.

"The problem with popularly elected presidents is that campaigns often turn into a popularity contest," she said. "When you get all your friends to vote, it feels like a lot of times it turns into contest."

Through her experience in the Association of Michigan Universities and the University of Michigan's student government, Leung said ASMSU probably doesn't need to align itself with other universities and create a unicameral system.

"I've looked at a lot of student governments and they're all different," she said. "It's really hard to say what works the best because most student governments work good in general.

"MSU isn't that unique, they're just different."

Leung added that like ASMSU, the University of Michigan's student government, is searching for ways to increase its accountability to students, even though it has a popularly elected president.

Separate or divided future

Forest and Schepers are eagerly awaiting proposals from the Constitutional Convention Committee in January. ASMSU members will vote during a joint assembly meeting, and the ones that pass will go on the general student elections ballot in March.

The committee can recommend changing any part of the student government's constitution. It provides the reform alliance a chance to shape structural changes.

In the past, these changes were proposed before ASMSU's general assemblies and were often too radical for members to pass. But because changes are being presented in the constitutional committee, a smaller group than the assemblies, the alliance might be able to persuade and convince more members to take its side before an ultimatum vote.