HARRISBURG — The board of the State System of Higher Education is scheduling a special meeting Wednesday to select the fourth-ever chancellor.

System officials made the announcement Monday.

The board is keeping the names of the three finalists for the highest-paid post in Pennsylvania state government a secret for the first time in the system’s 31 years. Most trustees are appointed by the governor, and Gov. Tom Corbett’s higher education adviser, Ronald Tomalis, is apparently a finalist.

Slippery Rock University is one of the 14 schools in the state system, which has about 115,000 students. It is the nation’s 13th-largest public university system.

The system’s first three chancellors all had a background in university administration and a doctoral degree. Tomalis has held top-level positions in both the federal and state Department of Education for much of the last 18 years.