Student retention has been a problem for historically Black colleges and universities (HBCUs) for many years. Academic advising has been used to improve retention. This quantitative correlational study addressed the lack of research on the relationship between academic advising modalities, academic advising, self-assessed academic learning outcomes, and student persistence at two HBCUs. Tinto's student retention theory framed the examination of academic advising, self-assessed academic advising learning outcomes, and student persistence. Ajzen's theory of planned behavior framed the relationship between a student's intention to persist, predicting the student's actual persistence to the next term. Research Question 1 examined academic advising modalities, academic advising, and self-assessed academic advising learning outcomes predicting student persistence. Research Question 2 examined the relationship of students' persistence intentions to students' actual persistence to the next term at two HBCUs. Logistic regression was used to understand how self-assessed academic advising learning outcomes predict student persistence. The predictive discriminant analysis compared the prediction intent to persist to actual persistence. Results suggest that self-assessed academic advising learning outcomes predict a student's intention to persist to the next term. Findings could be used to improve communications between advisors and students and improve student persistence by increasing their knowledge of academic systems. Study findings may have a positive social change by increasing the student persistence rate at HBCUs, thereby strengthening the financial position of HBCUs and increasing the number of college graduates in African American communities. [The dissertation citations contained here are published with the permission of ProQuest LLC. Further reproduction is prohibited without permission. Copies of dissertations may be obtained by Telephone (800) 1-800-521-0600. Web page: http://bibliotheek.ehb.be:2222/en-US/products/dissertations/individuals.shtml.]