Healthier, wealthier and wiser – Gen Alpha’s future looks bright.

Ten years ago, the Sunday Herald Sun introduced you to 100 babies born on 100 consecutive days at 18 hospitals across Victoria, to celebrate the joy of new life.

Now 10 years on, we’ve revisited the children to discover the triumphs and challenges of their lives to date and share their exciting plans for the future.

These seven 10-year-olds from the original 100 are a snapshot of Victoria’s future – multicultural, optimistic and brimming with ideas.

As members of Gen Alpha, they can expect to live longer and healthier lives, enjoy greater prosperity and achieve higher education than any previous generation.

In the 10 years since they were born, the world has changed dramatically.

Earth’s population has grown by almost a billion, Melbourne’s median house price has nearly doubled, and new technologies such as AI have created both excitement and trepidation.

Like any loving parents, their mums and dads worry about their future – climate change, social media, the economic crisis, technology, a new pandemic worse than Covid-19.

And while most of the parents simply wish for their children to be healthy and happy, these spirited 10-year-olds have boldplans for the future.

Showing wisdom far beyond her years, Emaira Tomar, from Williams Landing, plans to be a neurosurgeon or heart surgeon – because “this world needs a lot of them”.

Ruansh Chowdhury, from Wyndham Vale, hopes to be “an Australian national team cricketer like Shane Warne”.

Koby Robertson, from Ballarat, dreams of becoming a professional enduro motorbike rider, while Bianca Sommers, from Melbourne, wants to be a tennis player.

Saira Bakshi, from Point Cook, plans to become a zoologist.

Ben Steinhauser, from Doreen, has his heart set on becoming a real estate agent.

“I want to dress up in a suit and drive a sports car!” he explained.

And Andy Zhu, from Notting Hill, is truly reaching for the stars.

“I want to be an astronaut so I can explore space and research stars and planets,” he said.

For these 10-year-olds, Covid-19 lockdowns, remote learning, mask wearing and sport cancellations formed a defining chapterof their early primary school years.

But most have bounced back better than ever, equipped with a new resilience.

Ruansh’s mum, Priyanka Chakraborty, said the Covid years were highly stressful, both financially and mentally, and took atoll on her son’s physical and mental wellbeing.

“Fortunately, he was able to quickly recover and cope with the post-Covid life,” she said.

Now, Ruansh is one of the top students in his class and recently achieved a best-in-school award in the Australian Mathematics Competition.

Ms Chakraborty’s biggest hope is whatever Ruansh does in life, from studying to playing cricket, he will “be the best in itand make a big difference for the society and country”.

For Ben, the challenges of Covid-19 were exacerbated when he moved house and changed schools in the midst of the pandemic.

“His first day at his new school was on an online Zoom call!” his mum, Kristy Steinhauser, said.

Clinical psychologist Dr Zena Burgess, CEO of the Australian Psychological Society, said a child’s first 10 years were an “incredibly important” period in their development.

“As well as being a time when children learn about being in a family, it’s when they learn resilience, empathy for other peopleand how to be in a team,” she said.

While the Covid-19 pandemic was a tough time for children, Dr Burgess said several positives emerged from it.

“It teaches them about resilience and building positive relationships and flexibility,” she said.

“Even for young kids that didn’t have an opportunity to socialise at the time they would normally do it, it just means they’velearned those skills a little later.

“In fact, children are much more flexible and adaptive than we are as adults.”

For our 10-year-olds, reaching double digits this year has been a big milestone, accompanied by new privileges and opportunitiesto be independent.

For Ben, the best part about turning 10 is “being old enough to choose what I want to buy at the shops with my pocket moneyand birthday money”.

Saira says the best part is “getting more allowance”, while Emaira, wise as ever, likes making more of her own decisions andbeing “independently able to help my parents in daily household life.”

Social researcher Mark McCrindle said today’s 10-year-olds could expect to have six separate careers over their lifetime,work until their 70s, live to their 90s – and enjoy greater health and wealth than any previous generation.

“This will be a globally connected, the most technologically savvy and formally educated generation in history, emerging intothe workforce at a time when there’s mass retirements and an ageing profile,” he said.

“So what an opportunity for them to be leaders, influencers, earners at a time when there’s going to be shortfalls in theworkforce and opportunities to make those impacts.”

The 10-year-olds are experiencing vastly different childhoods from their parents, with more technology including video games,social media and YouTube, and less free outdoor play.

Like the majority of modern mums, Ms Steinhauser juggles work and family, and can’t be there for her kids every afternoonlike her non-working mum was when she was growing up.

“I’m not there to sit side-by-side to do their homework after school, so they probably fend for themselves a bit more than I ever did,” she said.

For Bianca’s mum, Cindi Sommers, watching her daughter enjoy more opportunities than she had growing up in South Africa hasbeen a joy.

“Being Australian has just been so fantastic for her, to live in such an amazing country and to have the opportunities thatshe does have, and the freedom that she has,” she said.

“She goes to a wonderful school and has wonderful friends.”

As for the children’s future challenges, their parents’ concerns are plentiful.

Ms Chakraborty said Ruansh’s possible challenges would be more pandemics, climate change impact, natural disasters, man-madedisasters such as war, and “technological revolution – AI and machine learning – and robots taking the place of humans”.

For Ms Sommers, like many, the biggest worries are the rising cost of living and plummeting housing affordability.

“It will really be hard for them to own their own assets and it will probably come down to parental help in the end,” shesaid.

Without exception, the children’s parents believe their kids have made them better people.

Koby’s mum, Lisa Robertson, said the first decade of her son’s life had been “10 years of growth, fun, tears, laughter andlessons”.

“He’s taught us more about life in the best possible way than we ever expected or imagined,” she said.

Emaira’s mum, Archana Panwar, said life had become “very mechanical” and the couple forgot to look for happiness in the littlethings in life before their two children were born.

“Their childish things fill us with happiness and even bring out the little child out of me,” she said.

“I learnt and am still learning how not to be judgmental and it has made me a more forgiving person.”

Andy’s dad, Yong Zhang, said it had been an incredible journey witnessing his son’s growth and development, and he was excitedto watch him in coming years “evolve into an amazing person”.

“I have a deep love for Andy, and I’m incredibly proud of everything about him,” he said.