In 1968, she enrolled in the social work undergraduate program at Quebec City's Université Laval.
At the time, Marois recalls, she was more interested in the condition of the poor and in international issues than other issues such as the status of the French language or the Quebec independence movement.
According to her autobiography, she participated in a study on housing in the city's Lower Town and demonstrated against the Vietnam War.

The next year, she married Claude Blanchet, a young man from a nearby village and her high school sweetheart.
Despite their differences – Blanchet was a budding entrepreneur who bought his first gas station at the age of 17, while a student in business administration — the young couple began a lifelong relationship.

In September 1970, she got an internship in Hull, where she helped with the creation of a local chapter of the Association coopérative d'économie familiale (ACEF) — a consumer advocacy group —, while her husband was hired by Campeau Corporation, a real estate developer part of Power Corporation.
At the time, the region was rapidly expanding due to the growth of the federal bureaucracy and the construction of administrative buildings on the Quebec side of the Ottawa River was met with opposition, according to Marois, because it did not take "into account the needs and the housing conditions of the local population."

This internship, which coincided with the October Crisis and her return to Quebec City to graduate at the spring of 1971, had a profound impact on Marois. "
I arrived in the Outaouais as a French Canadian.
I left the region identifying forever as a Quebecer", she declared in her 2008 autobiography, Québécoise!.
In 1968, she enrolled in the social work undergraduate program at Quebec City's Université Laval. At the time, Marois recalls, she was more interested in the condition of the poor and in international issues than other issues such as the status of the French language or the Quebec independence movement. According to her autobiography, she participated in a study on housing in the city's Lower Town and demonstrated against the Vietnam War.
The next year, she married Claude Blanchet, a young man from a nearby village and her high school sweetheart. Despite their differences – Blanchet was a budding entrepreneur who bought his first gas station at the age of 17, while a student in business administration — the young couple began a lifelong relationship.
In September 1970, she got an internship in Hull, where she helped with the creation of a local chapter of the Association coopérative d'économie familiale (ACEF) — a consumer advocacy group —, while her husband was hired by Campeau Corporation, a real estate developer part of Power Corporation. At the time, the region was rapidly expanding due to the growth of the federal bureaucracy and the construction of administrative buildings on the Quebec side of the Ottawa River was met with opposition, according to Marois, because it did not take "into account the needs and the housing conditions of the local population."
This internship, which coincided with the October Crisis and her return to Quebec City to graduate at the spring of 1971, had a profound impact on Marois. "I arrived in the Outaouais as a French Canadian. I left the region identifying forever as a Quebecer", she declared in her 2008 autobiography, Québécoise!.
Pauline Marois