I asked my teacher for a letter of recommendation and I couldn’t read it until after I submitted my application. My teacher sent me a pdf of the letter and it stated positive things, but It was very generic, short, and she sounded uninterested. It was only a few paragraphs long and it only restated things on my resume. Will it hurt my chances? My English teacher wrote a great letter and hopefully it will compensate for the weak letter.
Is there a way to replace a recommender for colleges I haven’t applied to yet?
Depends what colleges you are applying to. If you are applying to top schools (T20) then obviously it will hurt–they have so many qualified applicants that a huge emphasis is placed on recommendation letters, and if one of them is unimpressive, then that will hurt significantly because they want students that stand out in the classroom, not blend in. And yes, you can remove her as a recommender for colleges you haven’t applied to yet, I would highly advise this if you are applying to top colleges. Also, length of the rec doesn’t matter too much; quality over quantity, but obviously it should be close to a page ish at least.
^Agree that it would hurt for a T20 school. You absolutely can replace your recommender, but this is late in the game, so you may find other teachers have full quotas. So if you are going to try, get to it - don’t waste time. Hopefully non-T20 colleges would see the short, cut-and-paste LOR is more a reflection of the teacher than you. While it won’t give you a boost, it may not hurt you as much as you might think either. I feel bad this happened to you.