Eleven hundred Maine school and library sites have computers plugged in, but the job of connecting them is not yet finished. And it won’t be until the people who run these centers of education have the training and ongoing support they need to make their high-tech investments as effective as possible.

The Public Utilities Commission three years ago ordered then-Nynex — now Bell Atlantic — to contribute $4 million a year for five years to provide services and equipment to Maine’s schools and libraries. The donation was part of a PUC decision that determined Nynex was annually collecting $14.4 million more than it should from ratepayers. The remaining $10.4 million was used to reduce rates.

In early 1996, Nynex and representatives of the state’s schools and libraries quickly negotiated a plan for the Maine School and Library Network that all sides assumed would use the total $20 million investment. In large part because the PUC was aggressive in determining the price for providing connections, the plan will be completed ahead of schedule and at half the total expected cost. By many measures, it has been a real success and an important link between Maine and the rest of the world. But what to do with the remaining $10 million?

The PUC will hold a hearing early next month on its proposal to use the money for rate reduction, a plan Bell Atlantic and the Public Advocate’s Office favor. The reduction would knock 50 cents a month off a planned increase of $3.50 a month. Reducing phone rates usually is a terrific idea, right up there with cutting taxes and respecting the flag, but part of the PUC’s proposal was based on the hope that the federal Telecommunications Act would provide schools and libraries with discount services through its e-rate program. The FCC cut e-rate in half last week, and some members of Congress, at the urging of the phone companies, would like to see it eliminated altogether.

More importantly, before the PUC commissioners decide that the computer connections have been completed and their original order satisfied, they must assure that the people using the equipment understand how to operate the machinery. Without thorough training for teachers and librarians, the PUC order amounts to little more than sticking wires in the sides of school buildings and libraries.

To truly connect, to take all those wires and chips carrying billions of bits of information and make them relevant and useful to the citizens of Maine will take more effort. Commissioners might drop in on schools, where students are using computers only in the most rudimentary ways, where teachers are frustrated because they cannot get software to operate and administrators know they cannot add a line on their local budgets for additional computer training.

This doesn’t happen everywhere, of course. Plenty of schools have top-notch computer advisors on staff and students doing some really remarkable work on the machines. But here’s a guess. The schools that can least afford computer-support personnel are the ones getting the least use out of the computer connection. It’s a joke when adults can’t figure out how to program a VCR; it’s a minor tragedy when educational equipment isn’t used because not enough teachers know how to help students learn from it.

More on-site training that slowly evolves into a support team for teachers and librarians who aren’t techies would improve the chances that the investment made in the hookups pay off. The money is there to transform the Maine School and Library Network from just another valuable program to a wonderfully effective opportunity for learning. The PUC should not pull the plug on it now.