NEW YORK (JTA) — Richard Joel, the president of Yeshiva University, announced that he will step down by the end of his current term.

Joel, 65, made the announcement Thursday, Sept. 10 in an email sent to Y.U. staff, students and alumni. Joel’s term is set to expire in 2018, but an official associated with Y.U. told JTA on condition of anonymity that Joel has agreed to step aside earlier if a successor is found and can begin before then.

Joel’s tenure at Yeshiva University, considered the flagship institution of modern Orthodoxy, has coincided with a severe decline in the university’s financial health. The first major public financial hit the university took came in 2008, when the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme caused significant losses to the university’s endowment and many of its major donors. But as the health of the overall economy improved, Yeshiva’s losses grew, and Y.U. has run an operating deficit for seven straight years. The school’s Albert Einstein College of Medicine is estimated to have been responsible for two-thirds of Y.U.’s annual operating deficits, according to Moody’s investor service. In Thursday’s email, Joel announced the signing of a deal to transfer Einstein’s operations and finances to the Bronx-based Montefiore Health Systems. Y.U. has been attempting to offload Einstein for some time. Around that time, Moody’s, which had downgraded Y.U.’s credit rating to B3, indicating a high credit risk, warned that the school could run out of money before it had time to address its deep deficits.

In March, the undergraduate faculty overwhelmingly passed a nonbinding no-confidence motion against Joel, prompting the board to issue a statement supporting him. The board said it was working with the outside advisers Alvarez & Marsal to implement a new financial plan and identify areas for streamlining and realignment. In his email, Joel said significant progress had been made.

Among the positive developments Joel cited were a new $15 million gift from Mordecai and Monique Katz; the planned launching of a new School of General Studies and Continuing Education; the planned offering of an online master’s program in marketing, and an increase in net undergraduate tuition revenue by nearly $6 million over the last two years.

Joel is the 129-year-old university’s fourth president and the first non-rabbi to head the institution. His immediate predecessor, Rabbi Norman Lamm, led Y.U. from 1976 until 2003.

(JTA’s Marcy Oster contributed to this report.)