Collage began as a companion piece to student newspaper Sidelines in 1968 and for many years was housed under MTSU Student Publications along with yearbook Midlander and Sidelines. In 2004, the Student Publications division dissolved, and the University Honors College began sponsoring Collage. Since that time, Collage has repeatedly won national recognition, including three Gold Crown Awards and five Silver Crown Awards from Columbia University.

Although some issues of Collage were lost during the transition from Campus Publications to the Honors College, all remaining issues, including the first issue in 1968, are archived at https://mtsu.edu/collage/issues.php.

Since its inception, Collage has accepted submissions of fiction, short plays, nonfiction, poetry, art, and photography, but in the last decade, song lyrics have been added, and most recently technology has enabled the journal to accept audio and video/film.

The only consistently printed creative journal on campus, each issue of Collage is produced by a student staff. Submissions are selected for publication through a blind online review process. Each semester, current MTSU students and recent alumni are invited to submit up to 4 original pieces per major genre: literature, visual, audio, and video/film. Top-rated submissions receive $75 creative expression awards.

Though housed in the Martin Honors Building, all MTSU students are invited to participate by submitting their creative works, and any student with a 3.0 GPA is invited to apply for the staff. An online application is available at https://mtsu.edu/collage/staff.php.

Collage, a campus fixture for over 50 years, remains a coveted source of peer validation for students’ original creative works. Acceptance into Collage is competitive but worth the effort. A published piece is a valuable resume booster and portfolio builder and is often a step toward publication in other journals.