The money was raised for the John E Smith ARC House at Mackay - a respite home for children and young adults up to 25 years of age with disabilities. The house enables their carers or parents to have a break from their 24/7 responsibilities.

Leande is employed in the office of Townsend Industries, one of Mackay's leading agricultural equipment suppliers, and received a lot of support from the company.

Born in South Africa, her parents moved to New Zealand when she was young and relocated to Mackay five years ago.

A self-confessed tomboy, the 19-year-old has been riding horses since a child and loves mustering cattle on horseback or on an ag-bike on the property next to her parents' home at Hay Point, 20 kilometres south of Mackay.

Leande obviously has rhythm as although she learnt piano as a child and is able to pick out a tune on a keyboard, she was also part of a four-girl group who came second in the New Zealand intermediate jazz dance competition when just in her teens.

To raise the funds for her charity, Leande ran a $2 raffle which had as the first prize a four-day holiday to New Zealand, with the other prizes being a digital TV and a touch-screen iPod.

To enter Miss Teen Australia, Leande had to complete an application form which asked a multitude of general knowledge questions.

Once accepted, she attended an elimination heat in Brisbane where finalists were chosen from 50 entrants from Queensland and the Northern Territory, where personality and poise were key requirements.

The Miss Teen final held at Sydney just before Christmas was between 16 girls from across the continent, with the winner progressing to the 2010 Miss Teen World final.

The John E Smith House is a project of MADEC, the Mackay and District Education Centre, which has just completed the building of the $1.3 million five-bedroom house that is being furnished and will be ready to occupy by the middle of this month.

It can accommodate four children and a supervisor overnight and up to 12 children during the daytime.

Leande chose the MADEC house as her charity because she is well acquainted with the special needs of the disabled, as her mother is an occupational therapist and from a child she accompanied her to hospitals where she often worked with disabled children.