Although many assume it is a regional magazine, it is nationally and internationally distributed and publishes writers from all over the United States and the world. It has published the work of both new and established writers, including Richard Foerster, Mari Sandoz, Eudora Welty, Truman Capote, Charles Bukowski, Marilyn Hacker, Alicia Ostriker, Ted Kooser, Robert Olen Butler, Raymond Carver, Joyce Carol Oates, Enid Shomer, Jesse Lee Kercheval, Tim Schaffert, Susan Fromberg Schaeffer, Lee Martin, Honoree Fanonne Jeffers, Tennessee Williams, Octavio Paz, Alberto Rios, Judith Ortiz Cofer, Rita Dove, Sharon Olds, Robert Peters, and many, many others.
Prairie Schooner's current editor is Hilda Raz, a Professor of English and Women's and Gender Studies at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln. Recent special issues have focused on ekphrastic poetry and poetry and prose on Yidishkayt.
Prairie Schooner has garnered reprints and honorable mentions in the Pushcart Prize anthologies and various of the Best American series, including Best American Short Stories, Best American Essays, Best American Mystery Stories, and Best American Nonrequired Reading.