Part of the new information highway is making sure people have the keys and know how to drive.

The University's recent decision to make the spring 1994 finals exam schedule available only through computers may have been a good long-term plan. But the switch was poorly planned and haphazardly executed.

In theory, utilizing the University's computer facilities should help to prepare students for the upcoming ride on the information superhighway. But without a roadmap, the theory will never become a reality.

Students should have been forewarned that the finals schedules would no longer be published. They should have been given detailed directions for operating GOPHER, the information server allowing students to access the exam schedule.

But that never occurred because University officials did not decide until the last minute not to publish the schedules in the paper. That poor planning has left thousands of students scrambling for computer help before conflict exam scheduling ends Friday.

Rather than making students more literate, students have found shortcuts to the information access process, such as reading schedules posted on bulletin boards by some computer lab attendants. They are, in effect, not using the system Penn State apparently wanted them to learn how to use.

In the future, officials should incorporate such drastic, but positive, changes in a more organized way. For example, GOPHER literacy could be taught as a component of the English 15/English 30 library assignment or as part of the Freshman Testing, Counseling and Advising Program. In any case, hopping on the highway of information will take a lot more than the University apparently anticipated.

For now at least, knowledge of GOPHER will remain buried underground like the furry animals who share the program's name. It will stay there until the University teaches students to drive on the information superhighway instead of idling in neutral.

The complete final exam schedule will appear in the Finals Schedule Issue of Collegian Magazine tomorrow.