tzippi, like I said earlier: “the dowry provided by the girls parents towards the Torah scholarship of the boy is appropriate depending on the individual shidduch in question.” You say you have boys and girls, and your girls are prepared; so you ask what about your boys. I suggest you prepare them. (I’m not sure why you prepared your girls but not your boys. Perhaps your girls are older?)
My point was that there is a problem out in the real world with many girls being unprepared. (I’m not applying this general principle to your [or any] girls specifically, just generally.) Too many girls have this imagination of marriage being a gilded life paved with gold and jewelry. It is imperative to educate our girls that this is mere fantasy. Life is not paved with a yellow (or gold) brick road. They must be prepared for the ups AND DOWNS that life throws them.