Young people suffering with a mental health issue need to know one thing, says UWindsor's first Rhodes Scholar Joshua Chauvin: “It gets brighter.”

Founder and executive director of the It Gets Brighter campaign, he says the vast majority of mental illness is treatable. Its online platform, which launched Wednesday, shares short video messages of hope from those living with a mental health issue and those who support them.

“We want to reinforce that mental health issues can, and should, improve provided that people seek out the help and support that are appropriate for their needs,” says Chauvin, a UWindsor grad (BA 2011) currently studying at the University of Oxford.

University students around the world have collaborated in developing the website, which already hosts more than two dozen videos. They encourage people to contribute their own messages to those in their communities struggling with a mental health challenge.

“We welcome anyone and everyone who wants to submit a video,” Chauvin says. “You don’t have to have a personal experience of mental illness to support those among us that do. Telling others that you’re there to listen can be just as strong of a message.”

Check out the website at itgetsbrighter.org.

A program of songs and arias is on offer Friday, January 30, when UWindsor alumnus Ross Osmun (BSc 1991, BMus 1994, B.Ed 1995) returns to campus for a concert in Assumption Hall.

Dr. Osmun chairs the music department at Bishop’s University, where he is professor of piano, piano literature and theory. He will join his equally talented wife, soprano Melinda Enns, in a performance that includes works by George Frederick Handel, Sergei Rachmaninoff and Edvard Grieg.

While at Windsor, Osmun studied with Gregory Butler. He has performed nationally as recitalist, accompanist and chamber musician with important debuts in Calgary, Banff, Regina, Winnipeg, Thunder Bay, Toronto, Quebec City and Charlottetown.

Enns has performed extensively on the operatic, oratorio and recital stages appearing as soloist with the Winnipeg, St. Luke’s and Windsor Symphony Orchestras, the Winnipeg Singers, and the Manitoba Chamber Orchestra. Currently a member of the voice faculty at Bishop’s University, she is the assistant conductor of the Bishop’s University Singers and maintains an active private teaching studio.

Their concert will begin at 7:30 p.m. in the Heritage Room, formerly Assumption University Chapel. Tickets are $15, with a student rate of $5. Order by phone at 519-253-3000, ext. 4212, or purchase online at www.uwindsor.ca/music. Find more information, including a concert program and performer biographies, on the event website.

The couple will also conduct a master class for student pianists and classical singers on Saturday, January 31. The event is free and open to observation by the public at 2 p.m. in room 126, Music Building.

Three artists with ties to the UWindsor campus will participate in the Art Gallery of Windsor’s exhibition, Border Cultures: Part Three (security, surveillance), one of its winter shows celebrating their openings with a public reception Friday, January 30.

Sessional instructor José Séoane will exhibit painted work that curator Srimoyee Mitra believes speaks to the theme.

“Moving back and forth between these internal and external boundaries, (the show) proposes the border as a site of struggle between personal subjectivities and systems of power,” she says. “Artists are the key agents here as their work moves from the symbolic and materiality of the border to a psychological and intimate space of despair, hope and desire.”

Alumnus Alex McKay (BFA 1990) will show Treaty Canoe, his performance/sculpture/installation piece that incorporates treaties penned onto handmade linen paper, as well as a collaboration with staffer Tory James—Treaty Canoe Voyager, which the two plan to send across Canada in a paddle relay.

“We want it to end its journey in Ottawa for Canada’s 150th birthday on July 1, 2017, bearing bundles of treaties,” says James.

Friday’s reception opens at 7 p.m. Admission is $7, free for gallery members. The Art Gallery of Windsor is located at 401 Riverside Drive West.