PROVIDENCE — Rhode Island College President John Nazarian announced yesterday that he will retire when his contract expires in June, capping 58 years at the college, the last 18 as president.

“I’ve been thinking about it for a while, but there was always something going on, and I want to leave the college in good hands,” Nazarian said in a phone interview.

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On his 75th birthday last month, Nazarian, who has been RIC president since 1990, met with Frank Caprio, chairman of the Board of Governors for Higher Education, and said he would not seek another three-year term as president.

“The name John Nazarian is synonymous with Rhode Island College,” Caprio said. “We are grateful for his years of dedicated service and will miss him, both as a colleague and a friend.”

The Board of Governors will establish a search committee within the coming weeks and will launch a national search for a new president, Caprio said.

Nazarian announced his decision yesterday in a campus-wide e-mail and a news release that was sent while he was en route to Indianapolis for a National Collegiate Athletic Association meeting.

A native of Pawtucket, Nazarian graduated from the Rhode Island College of Education, as it was then known, with a degree in math, in the spring of 1954. He never left. That fall he began his career at RIC as an instructor of math and physics.

Over the years, he was promoted to chairman of the math department, the first associate dean of arts and sciences and a full professor before becoming an administrator in the early 1970s. He served as vice president of administration and finance for 13 years before becoming RIC’s eighth president, in 1990.

“When I started here, I was a teenager,” Nazarian said. “But to make a commitment for another three years, well, it seemed presumptuous. You don’t know what will happen to you. Thank God I’m in good health and the college is in good shape. I’m happy I’ve been given the privilege to do what I’ve done. But I think it’s time.”

Nazarian has been known for his attention to detail, and was sometimes criticized for his micromanaging style. He personally signs more than a thousand diplomas each spring, frequently meets with and e-mails students, and attends even relatively minor meetings on construction projects.

“I prefer to call it nano-managing,” said sociology Prof. Jason Blank, who has taught at the college for close to 43 years. “There is nothing he didn’t know about what went on on campus. Nothing got by him.”

Blank, who is president of RIC’s faculty union, says he and the president clashed over the years, but usually managed to resolve problems. Blank said some faculty think it is time for a change at the helm, and will welcome the news of Nazarian’s departure.

“I personally did not want to see him go,” Blank said. “I see it as a good decision for him, and he’s left a great legacy here.”

The state’s budget problems and cuts at the three state colleges created “extraordinarily difficult times” at RIC the last few years, Blank said, “but he’s done very well for the college.”

Nazarian is credited with overseeing a period of growth at the college. Enrollment reached its highest level this fall, with almost 10,000 students. Several programs have expanded, including nursing, and the college added several new buildings during his tenure. Highlights include a $30-million, 363-bed residence hall that opened last month, a $4.8-million renovation of Alger Hall, and $5.7 million to expand and renovate the Student Union.

In 2000, the college dedicated a $10-million Center for the Performing Arts in honor of Nazarian, a gesture that the president says ranks among his happiest memories.

“Rhode Island College has been his life’s work, a place into which he poured his heart and soul,” said Jack Warner, state commissioner of higher education. “The students, faculty and staff are better off because John Nazarian was president.”

JUST AS RIC has been the center of his professional life, Nazarian’s family — his five brothers, all now deceased, and five sisters, all of whom live in the state, and their children — have been the center of his personal life. Nazarian, who never married, is also active in the Melkite Catholic Church.

“He’s a very, very family-oriented person,” Blank said. “At the same time, the Rhode Island College community has been his family also. He has shown incredible compassion to faculty members, people who are sick or who have a terminally ill spouse, or whose children are in trouble. He’s always there, behind the scenes.”

Nazarian said the college is ready for a fresh perspective.

“It was a hard decision,” he said. “But how long can a person continue? Things are changing. People are coming up through higher education with different ideas. I was probably the right person at the right time. But the times are changing and I am changing, too.”

Chris Giroux, Student Government vice president, says he has mixed feelings about Nazarian’s decision.

“I think it’s about time he finally goes, because change can be a good thing,” said Giroux, 22, of Smithfield. “But it will be sad to see him go, because he’s done a lot for this campus. Being a student leader, I’ve had the chance to get to know him and he is all about the students.”

Nick Lima, president of Student Government, says he will miss Nazarian’s institutional knowledge.

“He knows everything that has gone on at the college, everything about the problems of the past and the solutions for the future,” said Lima, 22, of Tiverton. “That’s a resource that will be missing now.”

Nazarian says he is looking forward to some unstructured time when he retires.

He hopes to spend time with his relatives, golf, travel and read a stack of James Patterson and Sidney Sheldon mystery novels that has grown tall in his Pawtucket home.

He intends to be a more active member of the boards on which he serves.

Nazarian says he may also return to the job he loved most — math teacher.

“One thing I think would be a lot of fun would be going into elementary schools and teaching mathematics, not on a daily basis, but from time to time,” he said. “That’s what I miss most, the teaching, the students.”

jjordan@projo.com