Advisor moving to a different school, should I move with him? I am currently a PhD student studying robotics at university A in my third year, and I've recently finished my qualifying exams and advanced to candidacy. My professor has been in contact with another university B, and they want to offer him a position there, so now I have two choices: stay at A, and finish up my PhD; or move with him to B, help set up the new lab, and finish my PhD there. BY the time I take this decision, I'd have finished three years into my PhD. The pros and cons are somewhat like this.


University A's PhD program is more research focused with minimal coursework. If I move to B, I am looking at an extra year/more of coursework, that probably will not be relevant to my research at all. Few schools seem to offer coursework that's directly in line with my research.
University B is better ranked; and if I move there, I will be part of a new research group that's just being set up. That could be a better platform, and I'd gain a lot of valuable experience being involved in a lot more projects.
Obviously, university B is a completely new place, new people etc. I've already spent about 5 years (master's+PhD) at A. 
Based on what the university website says, there don't seem to be a lot of course equivalents of what I'd already taken in my master's/PhD so far in the new university.
Personally, given the amount of time I'd spent in this city, and other such factors, I would prefer to stay at A.


Given these parameters, would it be worth moving to B, how it would set me back timeline wise and the possible advantages from the move?
There's no simple answer here. Contrary to "The Fire Guy," when I moved, all of my students stayed at their old institution—primarily for financial and personal reasons. However, I received approval from the department at my old university to continue advising the students who remained.

The big question that you haven't addressed is what you'd have left to do to finish at school A. Are you one or two years out from graduation, or more? And how much extra time would you need to spend at school B completing requirements? And are there other issues, such as teaching load and organizational duties, that may extend your time beyond what you'd have at school A?

As far as being involved in a lot of projects, that's a double-edged sword: you end up with an experience profile that's a mile wide, but not very deep. It's not something you tend to be able to convert into a PhD thesis relatively easily.