School colors (also known as university colors or college colors) are the colors chosen by a school as part of its brand identity, used on building signage, web pages, branded apparel, and the uniforms of sports teams. They can promote connection to the school – or 'school spirit' – and help differentiate it from other institutions. Background The tradition of school colors appears to have started in England in the 1830s. The University of Cambridge chose Cambridge blue for the Boat Race against the University of Oxford in 1836, Westminster School have used pink as their color since a boat race against Eton School in 1837, and Durham University adopted palatinate purple for its MA hood some time before that degree was first awarded in 1838. Many US colleges adopted school colors between 1890 and 1910. These were generally chosen to be distinctive, something that grew harder as more colors and color combinations were taken, although many Presbyterian colleges chose to imitate Princeton University's black and orange. Some American schools, in a display of patriotism, adopted the national colors of "red, white, or blue." The most popular colors among US colleges ranked in the 2012 Forbes Top 50 or in the 2013–13 NCAA basketball or cross-country rankings were white, blue, red, black, and gold. These same five colors were the most popular five colors among colleges in each of the three rankings individually. Sports The use of colors to identify university sports teams dates back at least to the second Boat Race between Oxford and Cambridge in 1836. While most universities use the same color(s) for their sports and other university branding, Cambridge Blue is only one of twelve colors in the supporting palette for the university, not one of their six core colors. The University of Nottingham uses green and gold for its sports, but the rest of the university uses blue as its brand color. Roger Williams University changed its athletics colors in 2018 to match the university colors, in order to "foster a strong, unified visual identity for RWU Athletics that is more cohesive with the overall University", stating that "this combination will be powerful in strengthening RWU's brand identity and awareness". Most competitive teams keep two sets of uniforms, with one emphasizing the primary color and the other emphasizing the secondary color. In some sports, such as American football, the primary color is emphasized on home