The Student Government Association has approved a bill that amends their constitution to account for a senator switching their major.

Before the amendment, there were no clear rules as to what would happen if a senator changed majors while in office, which would mean that the senator could potentially represent a department that their major is not affiliated with.

This new amendment allows senators to switch their constituency whenever they change their major or move to other seats, such as University At-Large or the Underserved Communities constituency, if they meet prerequisites. If the senator does not qualify to switch constituencies, a new temporary University At-Large seat will be created to account for the senator until another seat opens up.

Senators will need to provide a letter from their adviser to the speaker and their new academic college within 5 business days after changing their major to inform them of their change in constituency.

“It (the 5 day deadline) gives them enough time to get the change made to get the two letters that they require and then to report it to the speaker then to change their constituency over,” said Deputy Speaker of the Senate Ethan DeMeuse, who authored the amendment.

The SGA also approved the Student Academy of Audiology student group, which is a chapter of the larger Student Academy of Audiology organization. SAA is a national student division of the American Academy of Audiology that aims to serve the interests of students pursuing careers in audiology, according to their website.

SGA meetings are open to the public and held weekly at NIU. SGA schedules and agendas can be viewed online via Huskie Hub at the bottom of the page.

Note: The SGA has not yet updated their bylaws to reflect the new legislation change. Relevant links included in this article will be updated accordingly upon the SGA’s revision.