Recognition of an incredible local cancer survivor with a heart of gold has now come from the highest quarters, with 19-year-old local lass, Molly Croft, named as the 2025 NSW Volunteer of the Year.

Molly’s incredible journey started when she was diagnosed with a rare form of aggressive bone cancer at only 12, turning many painful rounds of treatment and hospital stays into a journey that has changed lives.

Losing most of the bone in one leg and part of a lung, she has since set herself the goal to raise as much money as possible to fund cancer research.

She’s proven no slouch at this impressive aim, her tireless efforts banking more than $2 million for children’s charities — including $1 million for The Tie Dye Project — a not-for-profit she helped establish with Australian netballer, Amy Parmenter.

She also gives her time to the Kids with Cancer Foundation, the Kids Cancer Project, and is an ambassador for national mental health charity, Stand Tall.

Molly was presented with the award last Thursday afternoon in Sydney, December 4, after being first recognised as the regional winner for this prestigious prize.

The NSW Volunteer of the Year Awards are run by The Centre for Volunteering to celebrate the work and impact of volunteers across all of NSW, CEO Gemma Rygate said.

She added that the awards seek to “shine a light” on the efforts of all volunteers, as well as those that go above and beyond to help others, with the Dubbo teen a worthy winner.

“Molly sets an incredibly high bar by giving so much of her time, ideas and energy to helping others and motivating people of all ages to be their best,” Ms Rygate said.

“Her volunteering is so exceptional… an inspirational young person who stands tall over adversity and is also a deserving recipient of the 2025 NSW Volunteer of the Year Award,” she enthused.

Award winners across seven award categories were also announced at the ceremony in front of more than 300 community, business and political leaders.

“It’s fantastic to see a young volunteer like Molly turn adversity into an opportunity to do something meaningful to help others,” the NSW Minister with responsibility for volunteering, Jodie Harrison, said of her win.

“Volunteers give so much back to our communities, and this is one of the ways we recognise their valuable contributions; each and every one of them are incredible role models and an inspiration to all of us,” she added.

Before her diagnosis, Molly was a junior elite athlete spending her time hanging out with friends, kicking a ball around, and looking forward to her high school years.

“I’m just a local Dubbo girl, when I was growing up, I’d rather be at the sports court playing than at home doing schoolwork,” Molly told Dubbo Photo News in an earlier interview.

“I was a basketballer and a netballer, I played for NSW at basketball for my age, at centre, so yeah, I loved sport,” she added.

Her health journey began, she now remembers, after a major tournament when she found that her lower leg just didn’t feel quite right.

“I was down at the state-age netball tournament in July 2018, and we had played 18 games in only three days.

“After I came home, my leg began to lock up when I was doing things, it would just go stiff and I couldn’t move,” Molly now looks back.

This was the first step on a tortuous medical odyssey that would dominate the next few years of her young life.

“I got into an MRI in Dubbo, and got sent to a paediatrician, and he sent me to an appointment in Sydney at the Children’s Hospital at Westmead.

“I had to pack a bag and go straight away. The doctor looked at me and asked, if I’d ever known someone with cancer, and I was diagnosed on my 12th birthday.”

Thus began a marathon of treatment back-and-forth for the osteosarcoma (bone cancer) that was found in her lower limb.

“My initial treatment was for 292 nights at Westmead, from May 2019, then I’d be home for three weeks, and then back again.

“I then got an infection, and all of the bone was taken out of my right leg and replaced, first, with titanium, and now solid silver,” Molly revealed.

Things were then looking up for this brave young woman who was looking forward to finally getting back to her life in the golden west.

“I was still down there every three months for a week, but that was fine, and I was feeling good.

“But in September 2021, I relapsed with the cancer in my lungs, and I had part of my lung taken out.”

Throughout it all, though, was the steadfast support from Mum, Ange; Dad, John; sister Maddi, and friends.

“I was wrapped up in a lot of love and support.

“My parents would ask, ‘what was your rainbow for the day?’ meaning, something that had gone well for me,” Molly explained.

Just completing her first year at Macquarie University in marketing and communications, Molly has already undergone more tests, treatment, and surgery than most of us will experience in a lifetime, but her passion for life, her effervescence, and her determination to help find a cure for the disease that changed her life, is breathtaking.