The strategic management in the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine, which includes management decisions, is always associated with certain risks due to the high level of uncertainty in the internal and external environments. This totally applies to the decision-making process in project activities. At the same time, each alternative carries a greater or lesser risk of failure, wasted resources, effort and time. In this connection the article considers methodological issues of project management in the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine; a risk assessment model in the implementation of projects has been proposed and the risk impact on success probability of projects has been determined. The project management methodology depends on their scale, timing, location and conditions of implementation. But at all life cycle stages of any project, there will be problems associated with the presence of risks that will affect the project success negatively. One of the ways to reduce the risk in the project activities of organizations is to involve higher educational institutions, where significant scientific potential is concentrated. The article proposes the methodology for risk assessment of projects which are implemented in the State Border Guard Service of Ukraine together with the departmental educational institution which is based on probabilistic-statistical modelling using expert assessment. Taking into account that the activities of each of the project participants are associated with their own group of risks, the article identifies four main groups of risk factors.