Reflecting rising expectations for school students, improving literacy achievement has become a focus for educational policy makers internationally. In tandem with this trend, in Ireland literacy across all subject areas in post-primary education has emerged as a policy priority largely due to the attention afforded literacy by PISA results and concerns emerging out of whole school and/or subject evaluations. This paper based on the findings from the DES-funded Learning to Teach Study 1 (LETS1, 2008-09; Conway et al, 2011) undertaken prior to the National Numeracy and Literacy Study and the Irish Research Council-funded Learning to Teach Study 2 (LETS2, 2012-13; Conway et al, 2013) undertaken after the publication of the Strategy, provides a voice for and unique insight into student teachers’ changing understandings and experiences of literacy between 2008 and 2013. Findings from LETS 1 (Murphy et al, 2013) revealed a student teacher voice which generally saw literacy in a very traditional way as not the remit or responsibility of the post-primary subject teacher. Findings from LETS 2 (Conway, et al, 2013), while echoing some of those of LETS 1, do reveal a student teacher voice which acknowledges the increasing salience of literacy as a school wide concern and responsibility, and their adoption of particular strategies to reflect the increasing pedagogical attention to literacy development in post-primary schools. Findings are discussed in terms of highlighting the changing perceptions of and practices in literacy in initial teacher education and in post-primary schools in Ireland.