I think that your penny war for other charities is a great thing. Perhaps you can do a similar type thing and keep your penny war?

In our school district it is against the rules for kids to wear hats. So every so often for one cause or another some people will have a hat day but you have to pay a $1.00 "fine" to get to wear the hat. You could also have a change drive. Are raffles allowed where you are at? If you can get something big donated you can get alot of money. Also if you are not restricted on how many fundraisers you get you can do Chic Fil A nights and things like that. Do you use box tops? We are a small school but some of our box top money goes towards funding fielding trips. You could also just beg for money. I am not above that. Challenge every student and staffer to bring in a dollar or so for field trips, fun days, and whatever else you want to offer. If you are specific you may get more money.

I am wondering how others feel about this idea...
Every year our school has a penny war, for other charities. We raise some good money. Here is the question. since we are so broke as a PTO I was thinking about having a penny war for us. See our PTO has to be involved in every aspect of fundraising. So all the money would go to the kids, either a field trip (we never have) or other things for the kids. Any feed back is welcome.