Sawsan Mustapha Mahmassani

Sawsan Mahmassani was the second of the three daughters of Mustapha and Samira Mahmassani, born on January 11, 1973, in Beirut, Lebanon. She was a quiet little girl who loved to read, and excelled in school so much that she was recommended to skip a couple of grade levels. After enduring years of the Lebanese Civil War, the family immigrated to safety in Houston, Texas in 1984 with the help of Samira’s younger sibling, Saad Tabbara and his wife, Janet. Sawsan attended middle and high school in Spring Branch ISD, and graduated from Stratford High School in 1990 at the age of sixteen. Sawsan first attended the University of Texas at Austin, then transferred to the University of Houston to complete her bachelor’s degree in Mathematics. She briefly considered a major and career in Accounting, but her calling was always in math education. Shortly before she completed a Master’s degree at the University of Houston, Sawsan began teaching at Elsik High School 9th Grade Center in Alief ISD where she taught for 9 years. In 2008, she began teaching at Westside High School in Houston ISD where she was recognized as the Teacher of the Year in 2014.

At Westside High School, Sawsan mostly taught Algebra 2 and Pre-Calculus until she had to retire early in 2021 due to her ongoing battle with lung cancer. When classes went online during the pandemic, Sawsan took the initiative to convert her traditional interactive notebook normally kept in the classroom to an online version where her students could still show their hand-written work and she could check their progress. She spent many hours carefully designing thought-out lesson plans and assessments. She always offered tutorial sessions above and beyond what was required by the campus, and made sure that she was available to help every student in need. During her last semester of online teaching, Sawsan was surviving on a few hours of sleep every night while she suffered from excruciating pain which would later be explained by bone metastases of her cancer. Still, she logged on every day, greeted her students with a warm smile, and taught with everything she had until the very last day of her teaching career.

For 22 years, Sawsan welcomed every student into her classroom with open arms and an open mind. She spent many hours after school to provide extra tutoring for the students. She provided much more than math education to her students. Her classroom was always filled with students during lunch and after school because she provided a safe place where they could be themselves. If a student just needed a quiet place to sit and study, she would ask no questions and left them alone. If students needed to talk about personal problems, she would sit and listen to them and give them hugs and the reassurances that they needed. If a student just needed to cry it out, she sat there with them with a box of Kleenex. She was a good sport when people played jokes on her, and she had plenty of sarcasm and humor to keep you on your toes.

Outside of her classroom, Sawsan dedicated her time to care for her family. She helped take care of her beloved father and her grandmother when they were ill. She called her mother every day and visited her often. She spent many summers babysitting her nephew and niece. She would run to her sisters’ rescue whenever they needed her. She would also lend her ears to her friends who were going through tough times. Sawsan always put others first and was there to comfort them. Sawsan was a very private person, and would not easily open up to talk about herself, but she delivered her words carefully and with deep thought. She was always an excellent listener to everyone.

Sawsan loved her coffee dark and strong. She was not a morning person, and would prefer silence until she had her first cup of coffee. She loved to travel anywhere with a view of water. She would research all the restaurants around her trip destination and thoroughly studied their menus before the trip. Dessert was important to Sawsan, and she would light up if she found a pie place with good reviews. In the short 6 years with Jay, they traveled together to many places and loved sitting quietly by water. They fell in love with the little town of Seabeck in Washington where they watched the waves of Hood Canal with the Olympic Mountains as its backdrop. San Francisco, Muir Woods, and the Fish & Chips in Sausalito held a special place in her heart, and they visited there often. Mount Rainier in Washington and Big Sur, California were also her favorites. Sawsan also enjoyed traveling to the cliffs in Maine, Cape Cod, the Maroon Bells in Aspen, Colorado, and Osaka, Japan. At home, she enjoyed gathering with family, going out to good restaurants with friends, reading poems and fiction, playing word puzzles and watching British TV shows while cuddling with her dogs. Sawsan loved music and knew the words to most of the 80’s and the 90’s hit songs by heart. She enjoyed listening to and dancing to the music while cooking or baking her delicious zucchini bread or white chocolate raspberry cheesecake.

Sawsan, just like her namesake, Lily of the Valley, was small, beautiful, and delicate. Despite her delicate nature, she had an amazing strength inside. She touched many with her love and grace, and her love will linger in our hearts long beyond her time in this world.

Sawsan is survived by her spouse, Yukiko Jay Phillips, and her stepchildren Bailey Agnew and Abby Phillips. Sawsan leaves behind her mother, Samira Mahmassani, and her sisters, Souad Mahmassani and Souheir Mahmassani, along with her nephew Davis Kent and her niece Charlotte Kent. She will be greatly missed by her dogs, Truman, Nacho and Heidi.

She is preceded in death by her father, Mustapha Mahmassani, and her grandmother, Khadije Fayoumi.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that donations be made to a charity of your choice in Sawsan's memory.

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The family will receive guests for the service starting at 1:00 PM, Sunday, May 21, 2023 at Forest Park Westheimer Funeral Home, 12800 Westheimer Road, Houston, TX 77077. A memorial service will be held at 2:00 PM.

Fond memories and expressions of sympathy may be shared at www.forestparkwestheimer.com for the Mahmassani family.