Last year, the editors of CosmoGIRL! and Maria Menounos (a 2003 CG! Born to Lead Award winner) got to talking about community service. Isn't it amazing, we thought, that more and more kids today are making such a huge difference in the world? So we decided we'd start a contest to inspire teams of girls (and guys!) to come up with innovative ideas and make positive changes in their communities. We called it the CosmoGIRL! Cup (because of the Stanley Cup-inspired trophy the winners receive) and Garnier offered to award the winning team $10,000. Hundreds of teens started projects-like providing art therapy to abused kids, building a special baseball field for the disabled, and holding empowerment forums for young women. Now, six months later, CG! editors and a panel of celebrity judges including Maria have selected the team that made the biggest impact: the Has-Been Beauty Queens from Winder, Georgia. Here, team leader Jena Sims and two team members share the HBBQ story:

Jena, 16: "I lost both of my grandfathers to cancer, so I've always wanted to do something for cancer patients. I've been in lots of pageants, and I was watching one of my competition videos when I got the idea-why not have a pageant for kids with cancer? It's thrilling to be onstage and to hear your name called; I wanted to give these kids that feeling. So I got seven of my friends together for our CG! Cup team. All of them had pageant titles (even Will, who was named 1989's Patriot King when he was a baby!), and they all have family members with cancer, so they were behind the project 100 percent. We met up weekly to plan the pageant, and as the date came closer, we put ads in the local paper and on TV inviting kids with serious illnesses to sign up for it."

Will, 17: "The pageant was on March 19. That morning, the girls met with the female contestants to do hair and makeup-they wouldn't have been very pretty if I had done it! I hung out with the guy contestants, like Ryan (age 6). We crowned him Prince of Hope, and all of the kids got at least one award."

Tirrany, 18: "Our first pageant was a large task, but the team came together. Now we want our next one to be at The Hole in The Wall Gang, a camp for terminally ill kids in Ashford, Connecticut. Going into this, we thought we were going to change other people's lives, but we were the ones who really ended up changed."

CG! Cup Runners-Up: 2nd Place: You Go Girl, Bronx, NY; 3rd Place: Art From the Hearst, La Follette, TN

The Judges:
Maria Menounos of "Fantastic Four"
Kaley Cuoco of "8 Simple Rules"
Hilarie Burton of "One Tree Hill"
Matt Czuchry of "Gilmore Girls"
Wesley Jonathan of "What I Like About You"