Preparing for the First School
One of the biggest advantages of the pilot Support Service School is that teams don’t learn from a textbook — they learn in direct dialogue with people who have spent years working with the wounded and with the families of the fallen and missing. We’re glad to announce that Azov.Care and leading NGO-sector partners — Pryncyp, Legal 100, and Recovery — have joined the pilot.
Azov.Care — A Model Worth Scaling
Azov.Care is the support service of the 12th Special Forces Brigade “Azov” of Ukraine’s National Guard. The service has been operating since September 2024, beginning its work by supporting service members released from Russian captivity on August 24, 2024 — becoming one of the first and most successful structures of its kind within the National Guard.
Today, the service provides support across four areas — medical support, psychological assistance, socialization and readaptation, and professional development — reaching not only wounded soldiers of the brigade but also the families of service members and Azov veterans. Over time, the team has built a network of more than 50 partner companies and educational institutions.
Within the School, Azov.Care shares its established protocols while also comparing its own approaches with the practices of other teams — to test what scales and what needs adapting for other units.
The Strongest Voices from the NGO Sector
Pryncyp — a human rights organization founded in 2023. It protects the rights of service members and veterans, and works to shape modern veteran policy and legal protection for the wounded, former prisoners of war, and other vulnerable categories of military personnel.
Legal 100 — a legal aid organization operating since 2014. Over more than a decade, it has helped over 130,000 people, and currently advises around 3,000 service members, veterans, and families of the fallen, POWs, and the missing every month.
Recovery — a network of rehabilitation centers founded in 2022. Today it comprises 20 centers across Ukraine, providing medical rehabilitation, prosthetics support, and psychosocial care for severely wounded service members.
Each of these partners brings its own practical experience to the School — and, in turn, gets the chance to test its approaches against standards shaped by the experience of every team in the pilot. That’s the whole idea behind the School: not a single perfect model handed down from above, but the strongest teams working together on a standard that actually works.