How SWEI started
Marie founded SWEI in her first year in 2020. The idea sparked after repetitively observing an important lack of knowledge in sexual wellness when it came to university students, regardless of their cultural background. Students seemed to not know when or how to get tested for STIs, how or why to use protection in all types of sexual activities, the importance and the application of consent in different types of relationships, the benefits of masturbation, etc. On top of that, there seemed to be many cases where boundaries were crossed as student party culture and substance use increased the risk of sexual transgressive behaviour occurring. She noticed students didn’t know which resources to reach out to for any of the above situations, and, while the university offered resources, she didn’t think the resources were sufficient. She thought there was a huge gap between the student body and the university which needed to be bridged. Sexual wellness knowledge needed to be accessible and its importance needed to be highlighted. This is what made her come up with SWEI: a holistic sexual wellness curriculum offered every year to University students, as well as the creation of a team of trained people available to refer students to proper resources based on any questions they may have regarding sexual wellness. The University College of Groningen agreed to fund this organisation and supported SWEI’s goal to ultimately improve students' safety and wellbeing. SWEI has now been running for 3 years and its team continues to do their very best for the student body.
Founder; Marie Fournier (Canadian-French)
Marie finished high school in India where she built and implemented a program that made sports more available to women in high schools, along with being a firefighter for 2 years to preserve a biodiversity reserve. After graduating, she went back to Montreal where she worked briefly for the Green Party, and became active as an activist for climate justice. In 2019, she moved to Groningen to do her bachelor's in Liberal Arts and Sciences, specialising in international law and international relations where she founded and coordinated SWEI until October 2023. During her last year, she was also on the Board of the De Groene Uilen-Moestasj student basketball association. Marie is currently back in Montreal doing a Master's in political science. She now works at an organisation called GRIP (research organisation in psychosocial interventions) whose mission is to promote a positive experience for all populations attending festive environments through an informative and preventive harm reduction approach. She essentially works as a trained ‘angel’ in events around Montreal to test substances, intervene in cases of overdose, provide information on substance use and sexual wellness, and intervene in cases of sexual transgressive behaviour at these events.