Hoagland started his studies at the University of California, Berkeley in 1944. He completed his BS degree in Electrical Engineering in 1947, his MS in 1948, and his PhD in 1954 (Paul Morton, advisor). Hoagland became interested in the California Digital Computer (CALDIC) project being pursued at Berkeley and signed up with Paul L. Morton as research advisor and took on the responsibility for developing the system's magnetic drum memory.A. Hoagland, "Magnetic Disk Storage: a personal memoir", Computer History Museum, p.4, Sept. 2011 Hoagland received an M.Sc. in 1948 with a thesis entitled "Magnetic Storage Methods for Electronic Computation".Albert Smiley Hoagland, "Magnetic Storage Methods for Electronic Computation", University of California, Berkeley, Eighty-Sixth Commencement, p. 20, June 1949 He went on to obtain a Ph.D. in 1954 with the dissertation "Magnetic Recording of Binary Information","Magnetic Recording of Binary Information", Register - University of California, 91st Commencement, Berkeley, Vol. 2, p. 59, 1953-54 both under the supervision of Paul Morton. Hoagland was an assistant professor at Berkeley in 1954-55,
