Replying to Year off between high school and college...

I'm coming to the older members of NSG to give me a a hand here. I'm in my senior year of high school, and for the past few months, I've been thinking of taking a year for myself before I go to college. I've made plans already to begin a full time job at the local zoo, and have gotten in contact with the right people to volunteer with animals injured by oil spills across the country, so it's not like I'm just taking this year off to fuck around and do nothing. My question is, if you have done this, did it give you an advantage when going to college? Did you just not go to college after that year? Was anything more difficult because of this year off?