A CancerCare volunteer and fundraiser has had her achievements recognised on a national scale.

Alisha Potter, 21, was a finalist for BBC Radio Lancashire’s 2024 Make A Difference awards. Alisha, who lives in Lancaster, attended the awards ceremony held at Blackpool Tower on 21st September, where she found out that she’d made the top three.

Alisha is a regular CancerCare volunteer and in 2019 she held a sponsored head shave for the charity.

Alisha and her family initially used CancerCare’s services in 2014 when her younger brother, Shaun, was diagnosed with Hodgkin’s Lymphoma. Sadly, Shaun later passed away.

Alisha returned to CancerCare twice more times during her teen years to undertake one-to-one counselling sessions. She was a member of CancerCare’s Re-Fresh peer support group for the duration. Once she turned 17 and had reached the maximum age for the programme, she began volunteering on reception and in the support group Hug In A Mug.

She completed a work placement through Re-Fresh and she is currently undertaking training to become a youth leader via The Prince’s Trust.

“I’ve been volunteering since 2022 and I also help out with the young people in sessions at the centres and on trips,” Alisa said. “It’s been great to get my qualifications and in the future my aim is to go into charity youth work, specifically supporting those who are in need.”

Alisha had wanted to hold her fundraiser to support Shaun when he lost his hair during chemotherapy. When she finally got the opportunity to brave the shave, Alisha raised over £1000 for CancerCare.

“Within the head shave I held a cake sale, raffle, games and also sold refreshments,” Alisha said. “Volunteering for CancerCare has been so rewarding; it’s made me feel less alone and it’s nice to see other people improving and getting better. Before I went to Re-Fresh I felt very isolated. I thought I was so young for something like this to happen to me, but being part of the group made me feel free and comforted that there were other young people going through similar things. The therapists gave me different strategies on how to deal with things and I now feel able to cope with life's challenges.”

Alisha was surprised to hear she was up for the prestigious award: “I was in shock when I got a phone call from Graham Liver at BBC Lancashire who told me I’d been nominated!”