The Million Dollar Round Table’s (MDRT) Annual Meeting annual meeting opened in Toronto on Saturday and runs until Thursday. The one-of-a-kind event gathers more than 7,300 of the world’s leading life insurance and financial services professionals, hailing from more than 60 countries.

“Each year MDRT members come together for one of the greatest gatherings of financial services professionals in the world: the MDRT Annual Meeting,” says MDRT President Jim Rogers, a 35-year MDRT member from Vancouver. “MDRT’s meetings provide its members with inspiration, motivation and cutting-edge ideas.”

The theme of this year’s meeting is “Changing Lives,” chosen to represent the power MDRT members have to make a positive change in the lives of clients. Attendees will be exposed to some of the finest and most innovative sales ideas in the life insurance-based financial services business. The meeting will feature approximately 85 speakers, including Olympic Gold Medalist Mary Lou Retton and Andes Mountain crash survivor Nando Parrado.

As a way to give back to Toronto for hosting them for the 2008 MDRT Annual Meeting, MDRT, through its MDRT Foundation, provided US$70,000 recently to build a bright and colorful state-of-the-art playground at Lord Dufferin Jr. and Sr. Public School in downtown Toronto’s Regent Park neighbourhood. The playground was constructed May 19-23 by 13 MDRT volunteers from across Canada and around the world, as members of the community and children from the School looked on.

The MDRT Foundation is the philanthropic arm of MDRT. Since its formation in 1959, the Foundation has granted more than US$20.4 million to 1,700 charitable organizations serving people in 67 countries. In 2007, more than US$2.8 million in grants was distributed. Twenty-two organizations in Canada have received grants from the MDRT Foundation, including the Make-a-Wish Foundation of Toronto, Stephen Lewis Foundation and the Canadian MDRT Foundation.