Pres­i­dent Chris­tine Car­la Kan­ga­loo has chal­lenged cit­i­zens to em­brace per­son­al and na­tion­al trans­for­ma­tion, us­ing the steel­pan as a sym­bol of what is pos­si­ble when cre­ativ­i­ty, dis­ci­pline, and com­mu­ni­ty spir­it come to­geth­er.

Speak­ing at the launch of the Pres­i­dent’s Pan Camp 2025 at Pres­i­dent’s House yes­ter­day, Kan­ga­loo told the 25 young par­tic­i­pants that their jour­ney over the com­ing days could mir­ror the re­mark­able growth wit­nessed in last year’s co­hort.

“The qui­et ones found their voic­es. The un­sure grew in con­fi­dence,” she said, re­call­ing how 21 first-time pan play­ers learned and per­formed Mi­cal Te­ja’s DNA af­ter just five days of train­ing.

She urged this year’s campers to “ful­ly im­merse your­self in­to play­ing pan. Don’t be afraid to come out of your com­fort zone. Make new friends, learn new things and just have fun”.

The camp, now in its sec­ond year, con­tin­ues to fol­low the pa­n­yard mod­el—a blend of mu­si­cal in­struc­tion and men­tor­ship. Morn­ing ses­sions will fo­cus on learn­ing the steel­pan, while af­ter­noon ses­sions will ex­plore top­ics such as per­son­al re­spon­si­bil­i­ty, au­then­tic­i­ty, and re­silience.

Speak­ers this year in­clude Jus­tice of Ap­peal Gillian Lucky, Miss World Trinidad and To­ba­go 2025 An­na Lisa Nan­ton, and Guin­ness World Record-hold­ing pan­man Joshua Re­grel­lo. A group of 25 young To­bag­o­ni­ans from RBC Re­demp­tion Sounds will join for one of the men­tor­ship ses­sions.

The Pres­i­dent cred­it­ed the team be­hind the camp for bring­ing her vi­sion to life.

“Their cre­ativ­i­ty, will­ing­ness to sac­ri­fice, and pas­sion for youth em­pow­er­ment have rekin­dled in me the same sense of hope and pride I felt at the launch of the very first camp.”

De­scrib­ing the pan as “a sto­ry of lit­er­al, mu­si­cal and cul­tur­al trans­for­ma­tion,” Kan­ga­loo said the na­tion­al in­stru­ment of­fers a mod­el for change.

“Imag­ine the rip­ple ef­fects across ed­u­ca­tion, crime and com­mu­ni­ty de­vel­op­ment,” she said. “Imag­ine the kind of na­tion we could be­come if we gave our­selves space to let our in­nate cre­ativ­i­ty and re­source­ful­ness take flight.”

She end­ed by en­cour­ag­ing all cit­i­zens to com­mit to their own trans­for­ma­tion “in our homes, work­places, com­mu­ni­ties, and in our hearts”.