Harvard University could be losing up to 180 professors in the next four years with its new formal retirement program, the Boston Globe reported last week.

The university will offer voluntary retirement packages to 180 professors — 127 from the Faculty of Arts and Sciences and the rest from the medical school, divinity school, school of education and school of public health. The 180 eligible faculty, who must be older than 65 and who must have taught at Harvard for at least a decade to accept a retirement package, can choose to retire in one, two or four years. Depending on which time frame they choose, they can gradually decrease their teaching load while drawing a reduced salary. A Harvard spokesman told the Boston Globe the program won’t result in any short-term savings for the FAS, though there may be long-term savings.

The program is the first formal voluntary retirement program in the FAS’s history, and it could cut the school’s faculty by as much as 18 percent if every professor who is eligible for the program opts in without being replaced.