It was established in December 1939 and was published quarterly for its first 18 years, then bimonthly since 1956. It publishes articles that are intended to help academic librarians build an intellectual framework to serve the needs of collegiate users. The current editor in chief is Kristen Totleben (University of Rochester). The previous editor-in-chief was Wendi Arant Kaspar (Texas A&M University Policy Sciences and Economics Library).[2] The journal is open access since 2011.[3]
According to Journal Citation Reports, the journal has a 2017 impact factor of 1.626, ranking it 36th out of 88 journals in the category "Information Science & Library Science".[4]