This study advises teacher educators to focus on the micropolitics of teaching to help prospective teachers become more artistically effective in the classroom and more confident of their ability to successfully influence others with whom they interact every day. Being successfully nonconformist requires individual faculty members to find original ways to engage in day-to-day strategic decision making bargaining, and impression-management while pursuing their personal interests interactively with administrators, parents, and students. The study includes a description of a foundations course entitled "Survival Strategies for Classroom Teachers." This course helps teachers to be creative and artistic in their teaching; successfully work with students; handle discipline problems and limitations on time; motivate students; meet heavy administrative demands; and achieve tenure. The ultimate objective of the course is to help the highly creative and idiosyncratic teacher become politically sophisticated. (JD)