Juniors (left to right) John Skriver, Isaac McVey and Joe Edeker strategize their penny bomb on the seventh grade. Photo courtesy of WACO School District.

A little rivalry can be a good thing in the WACO Community School District, as the seventh through twelfth grade students held their annual Pennies for Parkview fundraiser.

For two weeks the students competed in a grade-by-grade competition to raise money for Parkview Home in Wayland. The students deposit silver coins and paper money as positive amounts in their grade’s locked clear container. All pennies counted as negative to the total grade’s money raised. So some classes strategically dropped “penny bombs” into other grades’ boxes in order to win.

Student council treasurer Caitlin Sells says there was an added incentive to the competition, “I think all the classes really wanted to win because if you win you get out of a test for a certain class, so I think everyone was really ambitious to get the most money.”

The seventh grade won and the fundraiser raised almost $3,000. Sells shares what the council will purchase for Parkview residents, “So we’re going to get them some socks that have grips on the bottom. We got them some card games, and notepads and colored pencils so they can color and write whatever they’d like.”

The student council will give those items and present a check of the remainder of the money to Parkview Home in January.