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Jesse Jackson was in Houston Wednesday speaking to local businesspeople and others about the need to involve minorities more in publicly traded corporations, and to urge parents to get more involved in their children's education. He spoke at the downtown Crowne Plaza during a symposium, "Building Capacity to Power America: Our Pipeline to Equanomics," organized by his Rainbow Push Coalition. According to the Houston Chronicle, Jackson told about 100 people at the luncheon that African-Americans battled through Jim Crow laws, earned the right to vote and gained other liberties, but now they must fight for economic equality.

He suggested that minorities buy stock in publicly traded corporations to have a say in the company's decisions. Rainbow Push Coalition, he said, is buying stock in the nation's largest public companies.      

       "We can be better, but not better off unless there are some economic securities," he said. "This is the fourth stage of our civil rights struggle. This stage of struggle is access to capital."

       Jackson also encouraged the participants to get involved with their children's education, including meeting their children's teachers, exchanging phone numbers with the teachers, picking up their children's report cards, turning off the television in their homes three hours a day and taking their children to their place of worship once a week.      

       His coalition, he said, hopes to enlist 20,000 parents in Houston and 2 million nationwide to make a greater commitment to their children's schooling.      

       "Nothing is more fundamental than the role of parents (in education)," he said.

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