The Department of Education on Thursday issued its first bid request for work to begin installing air conditioning in at least 1,000 public school classrooms — the same day Gov. David Ige signed legislation to fund the $100 million initiative.

“We’ve been working since Jan. 20, when the governor made his announcement, to be ready to execute when the funding became available to us,” said Dann Carlson, the DOE’s assistant superintendent for school facilities.

He said consultants have already analyzed the 33 schools deemed to be the hottest in the state, and have come up with design plans to begin cooling the classrooms in those schools. An estimated 969 classrooms in those schools will require air conditioning to bring their temperatures to comfortable levels, Carlson said.

“Now we just need to go out for bid. We couldn’t really go out for bid until we had the money,” he said. “With the $100 million we should be able to hit well over 1,000 classrooms. Not every classroom will necessarily have air conditioning, but we are attacking these priority schools with heat abatement.”

The work also will involve electrical upgrades to ensure schools can handle the increased loads as well as efforts to make schools more energy-efficient to help offset energy use. Amy Kunz, chief financial officer for the DOE, said the department — which has a $60 million annual utility budget — will be closely monitoring energy use at schools as air-conditioning projects come online.

Air conditioning is one part of the DOE’s heat abatement program, which also includes installing ceiling fans, solar-powered vents to draw out hot air, and heat-reflective roof systems. The department’s goal is for classroom temperatures to be at 76 degrees.

Of the 11,820 DOE classrooms across the state, roughly 4,400 have air conditioning. Forty-nine schools — or 19 percent of DOE schools — have at least 90 percent of their classrooms air-conditioned.

The DOE came under intense criticism last summer as temperatures climbed to record highs and teachers, students and parents complained about the sweltering conditions, which can make it hard to concentrate and even became a health hazard for some. The department last fall began deploying portable air conditioners as a temporary emergency fix.

In his State of the State speech in January, Ige pledged to cool 1,000 public school classrooms by the end of 2016. Lawmakers chose to fund the work using $100 million from the general treasury.

“I think we can all recall last summer … we had record temperatures in our schools. And we learned from our children and our teachers about the impossible conditions that existed in our public school classrooms,” Ige said Thursday at a bill signing ceremony for Senate Bill 3126. “It was a great rallying cry for all of us here in the Legislature about the fact that we needed to do something, that we could not in good conscience sit in the state Capitol without taking action.”

A number of legislators piled into the governor’s ceremonial room to help celebrate the accomplishment. Some cautioned DOE officials that they will be holding the department accountable for carrying out the work in the coming months.

“The heat and the temperatures in the classrooms really impact student learning, and now that we’ve committed $100 million — which is a large amount — it really is up to the Department of Education and the administration to make it work,” said Sylvia Luke (D, Punchbowl-Pauoa-Nuuanu), chairwoman of the House Finance Committee.

Michelle Kidani (D, West Maui-South Maui), chairwoman of the Senate Education Committee, added, “We look forward to the day that we have spent every damn penny of that to cool our schools and have a very good working environment for our students.”

Jill Tokuda (D, Kailua-Kaneohe), chairwoman of the Senate Ways and Means Committee, said, “As the parent of two little public school children, who come home with sweat pasted around their heads every day, that this is something that has been sorely needed. This is going to make a huge, huge difference in terms of the way our teachers can teach, in the way our students can learn.”

Corey Rosenlee, president of the Hawaii State Teachers Association, which helped shine a light on the issue, said, “I cannot begin to tell you the difference it makes for students. What it does is it allows them to focus on learning. Everyone’s able to focus on the lesson instead of this constant battle, where you’re just so focused on the heat that learning stops.”