Young Macmillan Champion Award winner 2020

Lucy is a second-year student at Sussex University and has volunteered at the Macmillan Horizon Centre’s café for 18 months, often running it on her own. She regularly covers several volunteer shifts across the week when no other volunteers are available and helps new volunteers to settle in, many of whom are 50 years her senior. Lucy chats to visitors to make them feel welcome and at home and has been praised by them for being “extremely helpful and caring."

She has persuaded the Sussex University Women’s Rugby Club to fundraise for the Macmillan Horizon Centre and has held a number of fundraising activities herself. Her efforts have not only raised funds, but also increased her peers’ understanding and awareness of Macmillan and of cancer as well.

The experience of having Lucy as a volunteer inspired the Horizon Centre to set up a formal partnership with Sussex University and since then, three more students have become volunteers at the café. The Horizon Centre staff and her fellow volunteers are all amazed at how much Lucy gives and the calm and balance she has been able to maintain, at her age, with so much going on in her life.

Everyone that meets Lucy thinks she is amazing and really deserves this award.