And Brian Lear on WNYC. So what is it that the protesters at Columbia and elsewhere are actually calling for?

In many cases they have moved the focus from the Israeli military campaign itself and US government participation in it to the role of

their colleges themselves, specifically calling for divestment from Israel in various ways, a part of the movement known as BDS or boycott, divest, and sanction, Israel.

USA Today staff writer Claire Thornton is writing about what the campus protesters are actually calling for.

She spoke to students at Columbia and Princeton specifically and what that would involve

to or what it would involve to implement what they want and she joins us to explain.

Claire, thank you for coming on.

Welcome to WNYC.

Hey Brian, thanks for having me.

You begin one of your articles by simply defining the word divest. Would you start there with a definition?

Yeah. So the word divest refers to diverting money that's in a university's endowment.

The endowment is the pool of money a college has and tries to grow through investments.

And student organizers at Columbia

are saying we should divest from weapons manufacturers,

companies that make military equipment

that they say is currently being used in Gaza because they say that the military attacks there go against

their values.

And Colombia's endowment is more than $13 billion.

It's one of the wealthiest universities in the country.

And so there's a lot of money at stake and these university students in addition to calling for a ceasefire

they're saying hey we're all part of this university community and we have this money that some of which may be being invested in

companies that are directly involved in the war in Gaza and we think that goes against our

...