

Raskin announced his resignation from the assistant professorship by flying over the Chancellor's house in a hot air balloon. There, he presented shows about toys as works of art. He worked as an assistant professor in the Visual Arts department from 1968 until 1974. Raskin later enrolled in a graduate music program at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD), but quit to teach art, photography, and computer science there. The first original computer application he wrote was a music application as part of his master's thesis. Even though he had completed work typical for a PhD, the university was not accredited for a PhD in computer science.

In 1967, he received a master's degree in computer science from Pennsylvania State University, after having switched from mathematical logic due to differences of opinion with his advisor. He received a BA in mathematics and a BS in physics with minors in philosophy and music from Stony Brook University. Jef Raskin was born in New York City to a secular Jewish family, whose surname is a matronymic from "Raske", Yiddish nickname for Rachel. Jef Raskin (born Jeff Raskin Ma– February 26, 2005) was an American human–computer interface expert who conceived and initiated the Macintosh project at Apple in the late 1970s.
