This was a few years ago.

I signed up to take an ethics class to satisfying an elective for my major, but this particular class was a requirement for students in the field it covered. I was one of a few students in the class without any sort of background info for that field, so I went into feeling unprepared (I should have signed up for a different class, I know). 

In the second or third week of class we were assigned a group project. There were 2 other people in my group, and they both happened to be foreign students, but had been studying that field for the past couple of years. When we met up and talked about how we would divide the work, we agreed to do equal research, but the two of them would present more than I would to the class, and I would do final write up of the paper because I was more confident in my writing. We figured since they've been studying that field for longer they'd be able to answer questions better than I would, and that I should write the final version of the paper because they weren't confident in their written English skills. 

Outside of the project I was really struggling in my other classes/with mental health issues. The school counselor suggested I medically withdraw because of my mental health issues. While that was all happening I tried reaching out to my group to see how their research was coming along and what the plan would be for our presentation, but they didn't answer me or provide me with any of their own research or anything for our presentation ever.

Out of spite I didn't tell them I was dropping. I figured if they didn't want to put in any effort for a project that mattered to them, why should I if I was just dropping the course anyway. I submitted paperwork to withdraw from school without telling them. The presentation still wasn't due for a couple of weeks at that point. After I submitted my withdrawal paperwork I didn't contact them again, or attend any more classes. They never contacted me until the morning the assignment was due. One of them sent me a text asking to email them both the paper so they could prepare for the presentation later that day. 

I told him was no problem, and emailed him a PDF I found online, where someone replaced every word in a 3 page report with the word chicken. There were graphs and foot notes and things so at first glance it looked real. 

When they got it they flipped out and blew up my phone. I told them that was the presentation I wanted to submit then ignored them. The professor sent me an email later telling me what an awful thing I had done and was going to fail me. I told her I'd already withdrawn, and that it wasn't only my responsibility to make sure that the assignment was completed. I pointed out that I hadn't been to any classes in over two weeks and that at no point had my group contributed any work anyway. 

I'm curious what my judgement is. 