Living the Golden Rule Grants

Living the Golden Rule Grants is sponsored by The Worthington Companies Foundation. Supports community causes in health, human services, youth education, and civic engagement in central Ohio.

Living the Golden Rule - The Worthington Companies Foundation The Worthington Companies Foundation, formerly known as the Worthington Industries Foundation, exists to support worthwhile community causes in the areas where we live and work. In fiscal year 2026, the Foundation contributed $3. 8M to 74 organizations in our focus areas of Health, Human Services, Youth & Education and Civic Causes.

Funded by Worthington Enterprises and Worthington Steel , the two public companies formed by the December 2023 split of the former Worthington Industries, the Foundation’s community efforts now have the power of two companies behind it. The Worthington Companies Foundation is a donor advised fund of The Columbus Foundation.

Boys & Girls Clubs of Columbus Canine Companions for Independence Children’s Hunger Alliance LSS CHOICES for Victims of Domestic Violence Columbus Association for the Performing Arts (CAPA) Columbus Blue Jackets Foundation Columbus Chapter of the National Football Foundation Columbus Council on World Affairs Columbus Early Learning Centers Columbus Metropolitan Library Foundation Columbus Speech and Hearing Center Columbus State Community College Down Syndrome Association of Central Ohio Franklin Park Conservatory Furniture Bank of Central Ohio Girl Scouts of Ohio’s Heartland Junior Achievement of Central Ohio Kaleidoscope Youth Center Law Enforcement Foundation National Church Residences National Groundwater Foundation National Veterans Memorial and Museum Nationwide Children’s Hospital Foundation New Albany Community Foundation Northwest State Community College Foundation Ohio Foundation of Independent Colleges Ohio State University Foundation Peggy R McConnell Worthington Center for the Arts Scouting America, Simon Kenton Council Spark Force – Manufacturers & Fabricators Foundation St.

Vincent Family Center Stowe Mission of Central Ohio Community Kitchen The Salvation Army of Central Ohio United Way of Central Ohio United Way of Delaware County Women’s Initiative for Sustainable Environment (WACCF) Worthington Educational Foundation Worthington Resource Pantry Citizenship & Sustainability Reports Children’s Hunger Alliance When children visit the doctor, access to nutritious food should be one less thing for families to worry about.

When clinicians at Nationwide Children’s Hospital noticed more children arriving for appointments with symptoms of hunger, Children’s Hunger Alliance (CHA) launched its Ready-to-Eat Meals program in 2020. The Worthington Companies Foundation was an early supporter and has contributed more than $250,000 as of 2026.

To make it easy for children experiencing food insecurity to access nutritious food, the program provides five-item meals that require no refrigeration or adult preparation and can be eaten at the clinic or taken home when needed. What began at five Nationwide Children’s resident clinics now reaches 14 primary care locations, providing approximately 48,000 meals each year.

Through this program and its broader work across 74 Ohio counties, CHA helps children reach their full potential by providing nutritious meals and food education where they live, learn and play. We have supported the Columbus Zoo, a treasured community asset, through educational programs and wildlife conservation efforts, for nearly 50 years.

Announced in 2026, The Worthington Companies Foundation and The McConnell Foundation are making a transformational gift of $10 million. As the Zoo prepares for its 100th anniversary, the gift will support the new, world-class John F. Wolfe Aquarium, conservation programs and signature projects at The Wilds.

Our relationship with the Zoo began in 1979, when John H. McConnell helped create a new outdoor gorilla habitat, an important milestone in the Zoo’s development. Over three generations, our contributions have supported the Zoo’s growth through investments in education, conservation and guest experiences, from the Water’s Edge event space and the first yurts at The Wilds to the Zoo’s Connecting People & Wildlife campaign.

Having been part of nearly half the Zoo’s history, we look forward to continuing that relationship into its next century. Junior Achievement of Central Ohio Preparing our youth for the future means making education relevant, engaging and connected to the real world. To help expand opportunities for students, The Worthington Companies Foundation invested $500,000 in Junior Achievement (JA) of Central Ohio’s Achieve More campaign.

The investment helped JA modernize its Columbus Learning Center, launch its Newark Learning Center and increase student engagement opportunities. During the 2025-26 school year, more than 43,000 students participated in at least one JA learning experience, including more than 20,000 who took part in immersive programs at a JA Learning Center.

The campaign broadens access to these transformative experiences, helping students build the skills and confidence needed for future success while strengthening talent pipelines and advancing economic mobility across Ohio. Nationwide Children’s Hospital Our relationship with Nationwide Children’s Hospital dates back more than 60 years, when company founder John H. McConnell made his first gift.

Building on this history, The Worthington Companies Foundation and The McConnell Foundation made a $7. 5 million multi-year gift to create the Worthington Companies Pediatric Research Fund. The Fund helps researchers fill critical funding gaps, enabling promising research to continue moving toward better outcomes for children.

In 2026, $1 million of our total donation is supporting five research projects focused on diseases and conditions including cystic fibrosis, multiple sclerosis, infectious disease, liver disease and recurrent childhood ear infections. With Nationwide Children’s serving children and families in more than 50 countries, the impact of research supported in Columbus has the potential to reach around the world.

Your Mission, Our Support We review grant requests twice a year: those received by May 1 will be notified in July, and grant requests received by October 1 will be notified in December.

The Worthington Companies Foundation accepts requests from nonprofit organizations with an IRS tax-exempt status under section 501(c)(3) and organizations in the local communities where we operate, with the majority of our financial support targeted in central Ohio.

We are unable to support individuals, religious organizations, ethnic organizations, labor groups, fraternal organizations or any request seeking financial support for debt retirement. We receive a very high volume of requests and, therefore, only a small percentage of requests are funded.