This collection contains student notes taken from lectures given by members of Princeton's faculty. They represent the broad range of courses taught at Princeton University. From the notes one can acquire a sense of student academic interests, advances in learning, and the increased specialization of courses.

Some of the lecture notes are very thorough documents while others are brief. Most of the notes are handwritten in lined, bound notebooks or on typical notebook paper. Examples from the early 19th century often include ink drawings and even watercolors to illustrate such things as scientific apparatus (see Frederick Giger's notes for Joseph Henry's Natural Philosophy in 1840) or the Greek classical orders (see Charles Shield's notes for Albert Dod's Architecture in 1842). Researchers can track the evolution of certain frequently reappearing courses over time. Examples include Joseph Henry's Natural Philosophy, with notes from 1835 to 1857, James McCosh's Psychology, with notes from 1869 to 1881, and Albert Friend's Northern Renaissance, with notes from 1939 to 1950. Changes in pedagogy are also reflected; courses in the 20th century with defined subjects such as mathematics and physics fell under the rubric of Natural Philosophy during the 19th century. Generalized history and literature courses later become specialized, as in Professor Eric Goldman's History of American Liberalism or Professor Carlos Baker's Romantic Movement in English Literature.

Aside from five university presidents (Hibben, Maclean, McCosh, Smith, and Wilson), there are numerous famous faculty represented in the collection, including Stephen Alexander, Lyman Atwater, Carlos Baker, Cyril Black, Cyrus Fogg Brackett, Hadley Cantril, John Duffield, Donald Egbert, Frank Fetter, Arnold Guyot, Walter "Buzzer" Hall, Joseph Henry, Edwin Kemmerer, Charles Rufus Morey, Erwin Panofsky, and Thomas Jefferson Wertenbaker. Some well-known students include John Maclean, William Magie, John Duffield, and John Hibben. The collection includes the lecture notes of one nineteenth-century woman, Louisa B. Maclean, niece of President Maclean, who sat in on James Murray's English Literature in 1878.