(ABC 6 NEWS) -- Schools in Fargo and Moorhead are cancelled this week, giving students the chance to help out in any way they can. But it's not just local students lending a hand.

We caught up with some students from Winona State University.

Tonight we show you why they couldn't just stand by and wait.

It's another long day of battle in the Red River Valley.

Sand to be moved and bags to be filled, but you wont hear any complaints.

"You gotta at least try and have optimism that you're making a difference," says Winona State student Matt Horel.

Matt is a second year grad student from Winona State University.

He doesn't know anyone in Moorhead, has no real connection to the city or its residents.

Still he has seen first hand what floodwater can do.

"I witnessed the Winona flood and that really impacted me. So I want to get out here and help them anyway we can because they came down to help us," says Horel.

One sandbag at a time, hundreds of volunteers are working to save the city of Moorhead, but for this group of Winona State students, every sandbag is personal.

"They came down and helped us, so I want to help them hopefully prevent this. I don't wish that on anybody, don't want that to happen," says Horel.

It's scenes like the one from August 2007, when water rushed through the streets of Winona wiping out homes, destroying businesses, and leaving residents with nothing, that have encouraged the students to make two trips to Moorhead in less than a week.

Fifty students came the first time, just two others, including Caitlin O'Conner, this time around.

"I figure 'why not?' They need help, and everybody would be there to do this for me," says O'Conner.

Residents are very thankful they've come.

"We're a people here, a community that when disaster looms, we pull together and we're going to win this one," says Moorhead Council Member Mark Hintermeyer.

That's a win the students are glad to be a part of.
  
"Hopefully, I'm going to make a difference at somebody's house, for at least one person, that'll make all the difference," says O'Conner.