Hi everyone. Does anyone know at what part of the admissions process that colleges perform the criminal background check? I am currently applying for Ph.D. programs in Physics, and unfortunately I have a summary offense for underage drinking from 5 years ago. Fortunately, this can be expunged after 5 years, but the process takes 4-8 months (i.e. my record won’t be clear until as late as early August 2016). I am wondering if I can get away with answering “No” on the application when asked if I have any prior (non-expunged) convictions on my record and hope that my record will have been cleared by the time any school does a background screening. If the background check is performed only after the student accepts, which I suspect it is, then I should be in the clear. However, I don’t want to answer “No”, and get caught in a lie. Any insight is much appreciated, but please spare me the lessons in ethics. Thanks!
I would ask in the grad section of the forum. This sort of discussion has come up before. But getting caught out in false info is certain death as opposed to not caring about minor stuff. ( what else will you falsify?) Be sure the question applies to what sounds like an infraction. --Oh I just saw your instruction on what we may answer you and sorry, tough for you on an open discussion board you don’t get a say.
Why even conceal this? I can’t think of any graduate program that would even slightly care about a single summary offense from 5 years prior. Heck, the programs to which I applied specifically asked only about misdemeanors and felonies because summary offenses just aren’t worth the trouble to investigate!
Many years ago, I was a student conduct director and our office responded to the background check inquiries. I actually don’t ever remember seeing a request from a graduate program (just law and med schools; jobs requiring FBI clearance, and education schools also do them because of classroom practicas involving minors). Having said that, I’m very confident that even the most competitive law and med programs wouldn’t care about an old underage drinking offense and I very much doubt a PhD program would either. However, everyone cares about lying – disclose it, say it’s being expunged and move on.
It is an open forum… and you KNOW this is a lie. I’d reveal it with an explanation,
I don’t think most graduate programs do criminal background checks, unless you’re going to a program where you’d have to do human services (social work, clinical psychology, etc.) And even if they did, nobody cares about your underage drinking offense 
For my graduate program we had to pass a criminal background check. They did the background check after I was already accepted and committed to my school. Whatever you do, don’t lie about anything!
Actually if you are a Teaching Assistant in front of a bunch of undergraduates, there is a requirement for a background check. This is done before you start teaching, so it would be in August 2016 or so. However, it is likely that even if you disclose it I am pretty sure that most physics programs (I do admissions for the Illinois Tech physics program) would not care too much about it.