Continuing an ongoing battle to attract local students, University of Illinois will not increase in-state tuition rates for next fall’s incoming freshmen, school leaders announced Tuesday.

Base annual tuition for Illinois freshmen would remain $12,036 in Urbana-Champaign, $10,584 in Chicago and $9,405 in Springfield, according to the proposal from university President Timothy Killeen.

Room and board and mandatory fees significantly increase the overall price of school before financial aid; those costs will increase for new students in Urbana-Champaign and Chicago.

Trustees will vote Thursday on the proposed rates and fees. Previous tuition freezes had broad support from trustees throughout the years.

If approved, it would mark the fifth straight year of the same in-state base tuition.

“This proposal helps to keep our doors open wide to Illinois students, providing a world-class education that will change their lives and expand a crucial pipeline of talent that already sends more than 22,000 new graduates into the workforce every year,” Killeen said in a statement.

Illinois law requires tuition rates to remain constant for students for four years.

The three-school system is in the midst of a multiyear push to increase overall enrollment by 15 percent but has intensified its focus on wooing Illinoisans, who have streamed out of state to attend college.

As recently as 2002, 29 percent of Illinois high school graduates who ultimately attended a four-year institution chose an out-of-state school. In 2016, the most recent year state data are available, nearly 46 percent of those prospective students left Illinois.

That trend materialized over several years in part because of big tuition spikes at several institutions. The issue has intensified recently as Illinoisans are finding generous scholarships or comparable prices at schools throughout the Midwest and, as the Tribune reported in April, in unexpected places such as the University of Alabama.

U. of I. officials previously have said the flagship campus is admitting more Illinois students but that generous scholarships from other schoolsare a big reason they do not enroll at Urbana-Champaign. The university has tried to address that as well by increasing financial aid and unrolling a free tuition package for low- and middle-income families. UIC also introduced a scholarship program for high-achieving local students.

Total enrollment across the three campuses nonetheless has broken records for six straight years, primarily driven by massive boons at UIC. Killeen said the three schools enroll 3,345 more Illinois undergraduates than in 2014.

As in past years, mandatory student fees as well as room and board will increase for most students.

Annual fees would increase by about 1 percent in Urbana-Champaign to $3,086 and by 3.6 percent to $3,308 in Chicago. The larger increase at UIC is in part because the Near West Side campus is planning significant expansions and upgrading existing facilities to accommodate its substantial growth.

Room and board for a standard double occupancy room in Urbana-Champaign will go up by 1.5 percent to $10,774 per year. This would be the first time in three years that cost is increasing.

The same type of room and board at UIC will run $11,260 a year, a 1.7 percent increase. Fees and room and board at Springfield would not change under the proposal.

drhodes@chicagotribune.com

Twitter @rhodes_dawn