When strong earthquakes happen, they shake people out of their ordinary rhythms and lifestyles, and not only in the earthquake-striken area. The emotional involvement brings to the attention of everybody the issue of seismic risk. However, the interest in these topics follows the same trend of some well known laws in seismology: the inverse of a Gutenberg-Richter law, for the number of reported news versus earthquake size, and an Omori-Utsu-like law with extremely fast decay in time. The lapse of memory occurs in a few days, depending also on the Gross National Product of the country.

As seismologists we know that risk reduction starts from the best practice of seismic safety and from the education of the community and of the next generation. In this session we would like to discuss the following topics: 1) role of education in reducing seismic risk; 2) how to keep the interest in earthquake alive during interseismic period; 3) effective ways to communicate seismic safety to children and young people; 4) contributions to earthquake public awareness and preparedness.

We welcome contributions on educational campaigns in different countries, pilot experiences, new educational concepts, activities developed for students at schools or any other issue related to educational seismology.