With the abolition of the Canal Zone government in 1979, Balboa High School, like the rest of the Canal Zone Schools system, fell under the Department of Defense Dependents Schools. Over the next two decades, the population of American Canal Zone dependents decreased as the population of the Canal Zone itself changed. Aside from thousands of American dependents of the Panama Canal Company (later Panama Canal Commission), Canal Zone Government and U.S. armed forces, Balboa High School was also the Alma Mater of many of Panama's business and political elite.