Why are college students protesting?

More than 2,300 people have been arrested at protests on college campuses in recent days, according to the Associated Press.

That includes protesters at the University of Texas at Austin, Dallas and Arlington.

What are the college protests about?

Protesters at college campuses have called for an immediate ceasefire to the Israel-Hamas war and for universities to divest, meaning they pull investments from companies that do business with, for and in Israel.

The war began on October 7, 2023, when Hamas unleashed a surprise attack on southern Israel, killing about 1,200 people and taking roughly 250 hostages.

Over the course of the war, more than 34,000 Palestinians have been killed, according to Gaza health officials.

Economists on divestment

Economists say the call for divestment is easier said than done.

"Nothing is impossible, but it's almost next to impossible," said SMU economics professor Mike Davis. "Mostly what these universities are doing is investing in equity funds and that means that they're part of a huge pool of investors that own actually several hundred different companies, so the universities don't actually have that much control over the particular companies that they invest in."

College and university endowments are a big part of this, donated money that can be in the billions for ongoing support and invested, generating revenue for the schools.

"All of these endowment funds, they're all wrapped up in these big, big blocks of stocks to try and remove a few companies from that, it would be like trying to take all the salt out of your snack food, it would be almost impossible to do and even if you could do it, it wouldn't taste very good," said Davis.

Davis says research shows past efforts to divest had limited impact.

"The one example of a divestment campaign that seemed to work was when it came to South Africa, apartheid, but there you remember that the politics were aligned against South Africa," said Davis.

If an institution did agree to divest, it would not be easy.

"The university endowment managers would have to somehow pick this out and pick that out and restructure their investments," explained Davis.

Investments bring revenue on the strength of big endowments.

"Those funds are there to make sure that the university can expand and continue on an ongoing basis. They pay for scholarships, research, they pay for buildings. Those funds are there to be maintained for the long term," said Davis.

For universities to divest it could take years because many investments in an endowment are sealed up with requirements that they be maintained or continued for many years.