YWAM involvement in Ukraine began in the early 1970's when Al Akimoff, leader of YWAM's Slavic Ministries, began taking teams with Bibles and Christian literature into Ukraine.

In April of 1991, Bill Blatz, from YWAM New York, started taking the two-week outreaches from the Mission Bridge Schools to Ukraine.

Other trips followed, and then in October 1992, a Discipleship Training School (DTS) began in New York with the express purpose of sending in a team to set up a permanent base in Kyiv, Ukraine. That team consisted of 5 YWAM staff who committed to stay in Ukraine and pioneer this new YWAM base in January of 1993.

Upon completion of this school, there were 7 new individuals committed to being a part of the first staff in Kyiv. Their goal was to plant the new center with a vision for nationwide evangelism and discipleship. Ukraine's first DTS in September of 1993 had 46 students from five nations. Since then, several DTSs have been successfully conducted in Kyiv and the staff has grown from the original 5 to over 70 workers.

Within the first 5 years, the Kyiv base has seen God working in a powerful way—over 15,000 Ukrainians have made professions of faith through evangelistic outreach and numerous short term mission teams have been hosted. YWAM Ukraine centers are now located in Kyiv, Ternopil, Lutsk and Simferopil.