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
German Judo Federation German Judo Federation The German Judo Federation (}) is an association of German judoka. The judo sport in West Germany was organized as a sport of heavy athletics from 1949 to 1954 in the German Athletes Federation (DAB). On 8 August 1953 the German Judo Association was founded by Dan-bearers of the German Dan-Kollegium (DDK) like Alfred Rhode of the 1st German Judo-Club (1st DJC in Frankfurt am Main). Alfred Rhode had introduced judo sport in Germany with the 1st DJC at his Frankfurt summer school in 1932. The separate areas of responsibility of the two associations DJB and DDK