Judo federations have promoted another eleven who are not recognized (at that level of rank) by the Kodokan. On July 28, 2011, the promotion board of USA Judo awarded Keiko Fukuda the rank of 10th "dan", who was the first woman to be promoted to judo's highest level, albeit not a Kodokan-recognized rank. Although "dan" ranks tend to be consistent between national organizations there is more variation in the "kyū" grades, with some countries having more "kyū" grades. Although initially "kyū" grade belt colours were uniformly white, today a variety of colours are used. The first black belts to denote a
Rank in Judo a patch specifying the practitioner's level. This is true for both "kyū" and "dan" levels. The USJF Juniors ranking system specifies ranks to 11th "kyū" ("jūichikyū"). The USJA Juniors ranking system specifies twelve levels of "kyū" rank, beginning with "Junior 1st Degree" (equivalent to "jūnikyū", or 12th "kyū") and ending with "Junior 12th Degree" (equivalent to "ikkyū"). As with the senior practitioners, the USJA recommends that juniors wear a patch specifying their rank. When a USJA Junior reaches the age of 17, their conversion to Senior rank is: Rank in Judo In Judo, improvement and understanding of the art is