The Mannes Preparatory Division, otherwise known as Mannes Prep, is the pre-college music education program offered by the Mannes School of Music, a division of The New School. This collection holds recordings of performances by Mannes Prep students from select periods, as well as some accompanying program materials, and photographs.

This collection consists of news clipping files and scrapbooks that document Mannes from its founding through the early 1990s. The scrapbooks, which cover the school's early history through the 1960s, contain concert programs, advertisements, and news articles. Other scrapbooks, some from before the establishment of Mannes, document the activities of the school's founders, David and Clara Mannes, in their work as musicians and educators.

This collection consists of documents generated and compiled by the office of the dean of the Mannes School of Music at The New School from 1989 to 2004, during the tenures of deans Charles Kaufman and Joel Lester. The documents include reports, publicity information, memoranda, and correspondence. The collection also includes letters of commendation to the Mannes College of Music written by noted musicians in 1958.

This collection contains several thousand photographs relating to the Mannes School of Music, from its early days in the 1910s through the 2000s, primarily representing the 1970s through the 1990s. Included are images of Mannes buildings; performances put on by different Mannes ensembles; administrative and academic events; the Mannes family; and Mannes personnel, including students, faculty, alumni, and guest artists and performers.

Consists of course catalogs with information about the policies, faculties and courses of Mannes School of Music. Collection includes a limited number of catalogs focused exclusively on the Extension Division, Preparatory Division, Summer School, and Jazz and Contemporary BFA Program, while most cover a broad range of courses.

The MFA in Contemporary Theatre and Performance program at The New School College of Performing Arts School of Drama was established in 2021 as an integrative curriculum in acting, writing, and directing. This collection contains video recordings of capstone thesis projects created collaboratively by students of the program as part of the curriculum.

The New School School of Drama was established as a master’s degree program in drama in partnership with The Actors Studio in 1994. The partnership ended in 2005, but the school continues as part of The New School’s performing arts programs as of 2026. The collection contains administrative files from the school’s founding until 2019, compiled by the office of the dean of the School of Drama.

The School of Drama, the dramatic arts program of The New School's College of Performing Arts, grew out of an affiliation with the Actors Studio initiated in the 1990s. This record group primarily documents student performances in the form of publicity materials, such as posters, postcards, fliers, and other print formats advertising individual productions and seasons. The record group also contains numerous clippings and printouts of online reviews.

Video documentation of performances spans 1997 through 2002, while print records cover academic years up through 2018.

The School of Jazz and Contemporary Music was established at The New School in 1986. These records, largely compiled by former dean Martin Mueller, cover the School of Jazz from its inception through Mueller's retirement in 2016. Includes administrative files pertaining to program planning, publicity materials, budget and fund raising, promotional materials, and photographs and event records documenting visiting artists, special events, classes, and student performances.

The College of Performing Arts is a division of The New School formed in 2015 and consisting of the Mannes School of Music, the School of Jazz and Contemporary Music, and the School of Drama. The collection contains printed publicity for concerts and events produced by the College and its constituent schools.