Announcing Global Horizons SGO…and Why We Only Want Ohio Donors

Summary

• Global Horizons SGO is a charitable scholarship granting organization (SGO) that awards scholarships to talented U.S. high school students who seek to positively impact the world.
• With each scholarship awarded, we also make a direct donation to a high-impact organization - i.e. organizations recommended by GiveWell, Animal Charity Evaluators, or Giving What We Can.
• Our unique offer to donors: We fundraise primarily from individual donors in the state of Ohio. As a certified SGO in Ohio, individual Ohio taxpayers can donate up to $750 each and receive a 100%, dollar-for-dollar tax credit when filing their Ohio state income taxes. That’s right, Ohio donors can receive 100% of their donation back as a tax credit when they file their Ohio state taxes (give $750, pay $750 less in taxes).
  • We expect our spending on scholarships vs. donations to be roughly 2:1, though this could change. So, for each $750 donation, we expect that ~$500 will go toward awarding scholarships and ~$250 will be directly donated to an impactful and cost-effective organization.
  • For Ohio donors who can use this tax credit, this is an incredibly high return-on-investment impact opportunity and should not affect other donation plans.
• How you can support our mission:
  • Do you live or work in the state of Ohio, or know someone who does? Please consider donating up to your maximum tax credit, or encourage your Ohio friends to donate. We’ve created a brief step-by-step guide to make donating easy. Again, we are only seeking donations from donors who can receive 100% of their donation back as a tax credit.
  • Ad hoc advising. Do you have experience with awarding scholarships or evaluating scholarship applications (especially for high school students), digital marketing, or individual donor acquisition? We would love to talk to you about potential volunteer advisory work (a few hours per quarter at most) and/or potential future board positions. Please contact me at [email protected].

**If you’re an Ohio taxpayer considering donating, this is a particularly good time to donate (as of this writing in January 2025). You can make your donation for the 2024 tax year up until the 2024 tax filing date of April 15, 2025. This means that if you donate now, you can claim your tax credit as soon as you file your 2024 Ohio taxes in the coming weeks.  For the procrastinators, you can donate on April 15 and claim your credit when filing your taxes that same day.

Key Activities and Theory of Change

We expect to have impact primarily through the following activities:

1. Awarding scholarships to talented U.S. high school students who seek to positively impact the world. We aim to enable high-achieving, impact-minded students to access quality education, and we prioritize supporting students from low-income households who may not otherwise be able to afford these educational opportunities.
   1. Our applicant evaluation process gives priority to students in low-income households in order to reduce inequality in accessing quality education.  
   2. A specific success mode we envision is providing scholarship awards that allow impact-minded students to attend a significantly better private school than they otherwise would have been able to afford. This better educational experience then contributes to opening additional future opportunities for students to have an even greater positive impact on the world.
2. Donations to existing high-impact organizations, such as those recommended by GiveWell, Animal Charity Evaluators, or Giving What We Can. With each scholarship we award, we also make a donation directly to an impactful and highly cost-effective charitable organization.
   1. While we are excited to support the next generation of leaders to work on global pressing problems, we are also motivated to support impactful organizations working on these problems today.
   2. We are relatively more certain about the impact of direct donations, as the cost-effectiveness of these organizations has been rigorously assessed.  As this forum’s audience is likely aware, the most impactful charities can have 100X+ the impact of an average charity.
   3. To maintain our SGO certification in Ohio and the associated tax credit, we are required to spend >50% of our programming funds on scholarship awards. With the remaining minority of the funds we raise, we will directly support highly-impactful and cost-effective organizations. We expect our spend on scholarships vs. donations to be roughly 2:1, though this could change slightly.

Importantly, we are only seeking donations from Ohio donors who can receive 100% of their donation back as a tax credit. As a result, we expect that all funds we raise will be counterfactually new funds for supporting talented students and high-impact organizations, and we will avoid funging donations that would have otherwise gone directly to other high-impact projects.

About the SGO Tax Credit

For those curious about the specifics of the tax credit, here is a brief summary of the key points. For Ohio taxpayers who are prospective donors, we’ve created a step-by-step donation guide to maximize your donation.

The Ohio Department of Taxation summarizes the tax credit as follows (source):

Individual taxpayers and pass-through entities can claim a credit for monetary donations made to an eligible scholarship granting organization (SGO). The credit equals the lesser of $750 or the total amount donated to SGOs during the tax year. If you are filing a joint return and both you and your spouse make eligible donations, each of you can claim this credit (up to $1,500 total). The tax credit may also be claimed for donations made on or before the unextended return due date, but the same contribution cannot be used to claim the credit in two tax years.

To be certified as a Scholarship Granting Organization, the organization must meet the following criteria (source):

• Be a religious or nonreligious nonprofit organization exempt from federal taxation under section 501(a) of the Internal Revenue Code as an organization described in section 501(c)(3) of the Internal Revenue Code.
• Primarily award academic scholarships for students to attend primary and secondary schools (K-12).
• Prioritize awarding scholarships to low-income primary and secondary school students.
• Comply with all registration and reporting requirements with the Ohio Attorney General applicable under the Ohio Charitable Trust Act and Ohio Revised Code.

Plans for 2025 and Beyond

We view 2025 as a 'pilot year' for the organization. I am currently leading this project on a part-time basis with exclusively volunteer support. We plan to focus on fundraising during Q1 and Q2 and open our first round of scholarship applications in the latter half of the year.

Pending how things go in 2025, we will consider ways to grow the organization in Ohio including more dedicated time spent on this project, additional marketing activities, and further improving our scholarship application and evaluation process.

While we are currently focused on fundraising in Ohio, we will also consider whether there are opportunities for our organization in other US states. Per this source, twenty states offer income tax credits for contributions to nonprofit SGOs, though it is yet unclear which, if any, other states will be a good fit for our mission.

How You Can Support our Work

Do you live in the state of Ohio, or know someone who does? Please consider donating up to your maximum tax credit, or encourage your Ohio friends to donate. We’ve created a brief step-by-step guide to make donating easy. We are only seeking donations from donors who can receive 100% of their donation back as an Ohio tax credit.

Donating (as an Ohio taxpayer) or sharing this post with your connections in Ohio, is the top way you can support us right now. 

We are also seeking a couple of volunteer advisors who could provide very limited (<5 hours per quarter) of ad hoc support on specific topics. Specifically, we would love to talk to people with experience awarding scholarships or evaluating scholarship applications (especially for high school students), digital marketing, or individual donor acquisition.

Please contact me at  [email protected] if you are interested in discussing further.